


I need you to kill me

by A_halfbakedideainthemiddleofthenight



Category: Xiaolin Showdown
Genre: A little gore, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Fake Character Death, I'm a corny dramatic new writer, M/M, Major character dead, Older Jack, Slow Burn, Time Passes, just so you know, long and slow, long fanfic, slow build up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 22:57:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 29,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16005050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_halfbakedideainthemiddleofthenight/pseuds/A_halfbakedideainthemiddleofthenight
Summary: Chase Young asks Jack Spicer how would he try to dethrone the prince of darkness, and challenges to plan an attack plan. Which leads to an actual attack plan.





	1. A challenge or a game

Prologue

“I need you to kill me.”  
It takes more than a moment for the self-proclaimed genius to process that sentence.  
“Wh- What?!” Jack twists his body to face the man sitting on the throne and consequently falls. “Did you...what did you say? ’Cause-” Jack continues to babble. Chase waits a moment for the shock to pass over the Goth, then he will explain.  
The millennium warlord had not survived his countless enemies’ attacks and plots by being cautious but by being rationally paranoid.  
Chase Young sold his soul, killed whole armies, built himself a throne and an empire.  
He won’t lose all he gained because he didn’t see the possibility of a threat.  
The warlord keeps himself fit for battle, knowledgeable of his surroundings, but mostly he prepares against any possible threats.  
Chase analyses his enemies and allies and constructs their possible plans to dethrone him before they can even consider it. The precaution has become a training exercise with time. A practice that feels more and more like a game now that he has grown so powerful that very few enemies can be considered a real threat.  
Now his precautions had become a dull, tedious game.  
Everyone, Xiaolin or Heylin, had proved themselves too predictable.  
Except for a particular fanboy.  
Jack Spicer was too much of a joke ever to be considered anything but an annoyance. The Goth had no focus and could barely hold a conversation, much less a long-term plot. He is too much of a coward to try to dethrone the Dark Prince. Physically weak, no allies, and clumsy. Lastly and simply put, Jack has the worst luck the stars could offer.  
But Jack could build an army in a week if he pleased, he creates technology that rival magic and everyone expects so little of him -no one would ever see an attack coming. However, to Chase Young Jack Spicer...feels safe.

The Goth stares at the warlord in absolute confusion and terror.  
“If you were to try to kill me, Spicer,” Chase continues, “how would you?”  
“I wouldn’t! What would the point be, anyway?” Jack puffs and moves to a standing position. “I wouldn’t be able to attack you even if I try to!”  
Chase almost laughs at how aggravated Jack looks. It sounds like the Goth genuinely cares.  
“That doesn’t answer my question,” Chase observes the teen’s horror grow as he caresses his flaming red, dyed hair.  
“This is a fucking test, isn’t it?” A smile forms on the pale face.  
“Yes, indeed. But you have yet to answer.”  
Jack takes a moment, studying the warlord’s features. Chase knows that over the years the Jack learned how to read a few of his micro expressions.  
“Why would you-” Jack stops mid-sentence, sudden understanding overflowing his mind.  
“Wow. I am flattered.” Chase doesn’t even try to stop his eyes from rolling to the ceiling.  
“I thought it is established that any attempt against my life would end with your death, your painful, slow death.”  
“You ask me?!” Chase glares to warn Jack of his tone, but nothing else is said. “I imagine this is your version of fun?”  
“It’s an important exercise,” Chase explains, and Jack moves closer to the throne, he sits by the war lord’s feet.  
“Are you sure you are not just bored?” Jack teases, but Chase doesn’t react.  
“Strategy is essential for survival. But to thrive, one must know their enemies’ and allies’ strategy.”  
Jack bites his lower lip to stop himself from interrupting. Chase takes a deliberately long pause to taunt him.  
“To be able to predict a person’s reactions in different sceneries requires a knowledge of the person’s core and a perfect understanding of the situation and risks.” Jack nods. “Some people are harder to comprehend than others. You, Spicer, are one of those people to me.” Jack smiles like it was a compliment.  
“Oh. You want to get to know me?!” Jack exaggerates his fake embarrassment. A few years back, Chase would have kicked Jack away for his tasteless commentaries, but the immortal accepted that those remarks are what Jack calls humor.  
“I had… a difficult time imagining what your strategy would be if you were to attack me.”  
“Well, that’s easy.” Jack jumps from where he was sitting. “I wouldn't!”  
Chase lifts an eyebrow, but the genius insists.  
“Why would I? There are easier ways for me to die that are less painful and embarrassing. And whatever I could try, I know, and you know, it wouldn't work.”  
“What if I took a lover?” Chase asks, and Jack chokes with his saliva.  
“And? How does that involve me?” Jack says, fully knowing that he can be more than a little irrational when jealous. He had done pretty over the top things for attention.  
But he has grown; he is no longer the arrogant trigger happy kid.  
“I guess I would warn them of the high maintenance, emotional riddle, war beast they are seeing and wait for their eventual failure.”  
Chase hums at Jack’s answer. Both men know that that was a lie, but neither wants to continue that conversation.  
“It could happen. The right circumstances to force you to attack with intent.”  
“Eh? I don’t see it.” Jack lies. The genius is a millennium younger than Chase Young but experienced enough to know that things could change out of his control and that he doesn’t understand himself enough yet to swear he would never do certain things.  
After all, in an alternate timeline, Jack took over the world and held Chase Young as his prisoner.  
“It could happen, Spicer. In the next ten, twenty, forty, sixty, a hundred years from now. You don’t know what time will bring you.”  
Jack barks out one of his loud laughs.  
“How long do you think I’m gonna live? I don’t even know if I want to make it to my fifties. Remember normal people of my socioeconomics and sex only live to their seventies, more or less.”  
“You are not normal, Jack. I will congratulate you when you become one hundred.”  
Jack stops as he takes in Chase being kind to him. The young man sighs and wonders if in one hundred years his love for this creature would end? And until then, how much is he willing to do for Chase Young?  
“So, you want me to kill you?” Jack parrots.  
“That’s what I said.”  
“When? How?”  
“That’s your problem.”  
“This is a game. This a fucking game to you?” Jack says more than a little irritated at Chase’s need to play with people.  
“Strategy,” the man answers unaffected by Jack’s glare.  
“Ahh!” Jack sits down and lets his head hang between his knees. Chase looks at Jack’s back; there is tension in his muscles but also control. Jack becomes oddly still when he is thinking. When Jack visualizes something that doesn't exist yet, something Jack will create; Jack can’t move. He needs silence and focuses that the young man typically lacks.  
“Stop that,” Jack says almost softly. “It gives me the creeps.” Chase turns his eyes away from Jack, allowing him to concentrate, and questions when he granted Jack permission to talk so casually to him.  
“I don’t have all day.” Chase states.  
“You are immortal!”  
“So? I have things to do.” Jack refrains himself from saying ‘No if you did then you wouldn't have asked me to fucking entertain you!’ but the young man decided that he preferred his life over his freedom to whine.  
“I guess I would use the sky.” Jack starts without any of his characteristic enthusiasm.  
“Mmm.” The noise was small, but it was packed with a loud and clear ‘I’m judging you.’  
“What?” Jack snaps.  
“It’s predictable,” Chase says looking bored.  
“I didn’t even start!”  
“And it’s already predictable.” Jack crosses his arms, and Chase knows it’s his silent way to ask to continue - 'please, explain further before I start insulting you, and it ends ugly for me because you can’t take anything.’  
“You don’t know how high I can fly or transport, and you are choosing to believe that it is not higher than your machines.” The immortal smiles awfully sweet as he takes Jack’s recent strategy apart. “Because the attacks are aerial, you imagine that my warriors won’t be able to aid me or that they won’t know how to. Lastly, you think you would be safe if you are as far away from the actual conflict as you can be.” Chase finishes and observes as Jack’s pale face becomes pink from embarrassment.  
“It’s not a bad idea in theory, but it is predictable. I want more from you.”  
“Well, you know that you are called a warlord for a reason, right?” Jack tries, but it only makes Chase chuckle.  
“Jack.” The teen looks at the inhuman eyes of his idol. “Surprise me.”


	2. Hate the Game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack Spicer considers Chase Young's challenge and asks for some ground rules.

Jack repeats the conversation in his head over and over again until he has analyzed every detail and continued to overthink every one of Chase’s words. The young man curses as he can’t find what the warlord wants hiding itheir conversation.  
The goth sits on his bed and starts undressing while he tries to think what the hell does Chase Young wants. He had been clear, well as clear as Chase Young could be -or wants to be.  
Chase hadn’t given Jack a time limit, for all the albino understood the challenge started today, and it would end when it would end -which was indefinite.  
The warlord hadn’t specified if anything was off limits: no warnings like ‘don’t blow up my lair,’ or ‘no kidnapping my minions.’  
Jack takes off his boots and throws them towards the pile of dirty clothes. He enjoys the relief of having his toes free and naked. The young man’s brain reminds him that Chase hadn’t promised his freedom and well-being. If Jack does a great job, like a miraculously good job at trying to dethrone Chase, and he destroys something precious to the dragon; would it be forgiven because it was a game or would he be held accountable? If one of Chase’s cat thinks he is an intruder planning something, then is he dead or would the cat only ‘pretend’ to attack him for intruding the palace and plotting against their master?  
“Fuck” Jack curses and lets his weight fall on his bed.  
He wants to sleep, but his brain won’t let him.  
The only one in real danger is him, the very human, fragile, albino genius.  
And all those are just details.  
He still has to come up with a plan that won’t be detect it and immediately dismantle by an expert strategist with a millennium's worth of experience. A plan to kill an all-powerful dark mage, legendary warrior, an immortal monster.  
“Fuck it!” Jack struggles with his covers. He’ll sleep because he is tired. He won’t spend a perfectly good sleeping-time on a fool’s errand with no benefits only because it is a fool’s errand from Chase Young.  
The young man decides this and closes his eyes, but his exhausted brain no longer wants to sleep.  
He twists in his bed as he tries to talk himself out of it. But explaining to Chase that he is chickening out after accepting ...whatever Jack agreed to.  
Anger fuels the genius. He drags himself to the edge of his bed and picks up his old dream notebook for dream-inventions.  
“Fuck everything!” Jack growls and a Jack-bot approaches him with a cup of coffee. “If Chase Young wants to be kill, then he better be writing his will right now!” Jack takes the mug and begins to think. 

He can’t use the air, at least not as his primary field. Chase already called it ‘predictable, ’ and 'disappointing' and 'boring' and how real is Jack supposed to take this game?  
Jack breathes in the bitter coffee; he holds the air trapped in his lungs for five seconds and then exhales.  
An aerial attack was a ‘no.’  
But using land seemed like a bad idea, most of the wars and battles Chase had fought had been on the ground. Chase already has too many points in his favor, no reason to give him more.  
The sea is too much of a mystery. Maybe Chase knows less, but even though Jack is proud of his swimming skills, he just doesn’t believe the ocean would be a smart choice for him. And Chase could make his cats into fishes, Maybe.  
Plus Omi would be pissed if Jack goes to the sea, the kid is weirdly possessive of the strangest things.  
The yin-yang world is a pretty neutral zone, but he can’t go there again.  
Space sounds nice. Jack stops and thinks of outer space. The infinitum cold and mysterious outer space. Jack has a small satellite just outside the earth’s orbit; he could use it, but he would risk being found out by other countries’ governments and then having to explain things…  
How would Jack even take Chase to outer space?  
Possible ways to attack or defend from possible attacks keep being formulated by Jack’s brain and is giving him a headache. Then he remembers that Chase didn’t say if he would strike back, but Jack has a strong feeling that he will.  
The goth gets out of bed. It will be morning soon and he has nothing.  
The only thing he knows is where not to attack, which is most of the world.  
The young man moves to his kitchen and looks for something to eat. He evaluates his options and starts to wish he could get out of doing this. But he said he would.  
He knows Chase will hold him to his word. Only death would be a credible enough excuse to stop him from performing his fanboy duty of entertaining the prince of darkness, Chase Young.  
Jack lets out a dry laugh.  
“I’m gonna die.” The albino says as he picks a banana pudding from the fridge, no surprise on his selection. He turns and closes the door with his hip.  
There is movement in the house, but Jack recognizes the silhouette of his robots or the soft noise of them rolling over the carpet any given day or night.  
“Turn on the T.V,” Jack says, and when he makes it to the sofa, the T.V. is on a Channel he likes.  
Jack sighs.  
He can't do it; he needs someone else to do it.  
The goth stops to consider if getting someone to help is against the rules, but Chase didn’t give him any rules. Pretty much anything as long as the master plan is Jack’s and it entertains Chase. Jack groans and decides that if after this he still has an okay relationship with Chase, he’ll buy the guy a T.V.  
Everyone’s life might become so much more comfortable.  
And everyone would owe a favor to Jack.  
Colorful rude cartoons play in front of him, and a persistent thought takes the form of an idea.  
‘What if I die?’ His mom would cry, Chase would be partially displeased with an unfinished game, Wuya… she might react, the monks would feel guilty since they were always crueler than they needed to be. Omi might have a harsher time; they were somewhat closer. Friends even.  
Scenarios play in his brain like a little movie cinema.  
‘Why would he die?’ To get it over with it or to make everyone think it was over. Jack plays with the idea. Chase had said that he looks at his enemies and allies possible plans, but no point in persecuting the dead. Except for Wuya, but Jack wasn’t a witch strong enough to hold to the realm of the living after his death. Jack would be out of the game…  
“How would he die?” Jack sighs and he opens his banana pudding.  
Jack doesn’t want to die. He has issues, big ‘go to therapy and stay there’ issues, but he wants to live. Jack enjoys living, so the genius would have to fake his death.  
It shouldn't be too hard. He has plenty of opportunities to possibly die, but it can’t be noticeable.  
Jack cannot be fighting and trip on someone’s weapon. And, if he fails people might become suspicious. He could just not avoid a piece of debris from a fight; there are always big boulders or large objects falling during and after the showdowns, and, well, accidents happen. Jack tries to imagine the scene taking place, but in his mind, one of his robots save him or a monk or even Chase. “They are all too fast,” Jack groans and takes an spoonful of pudding.  
It could happen -an accident that could end his life- but he knows to never root for the odds.  
He could do it himself. Jack considers it, but he quickly discarded the idea. People might believe it, and his psychologist might give reasons, his mother won’t doubt it, the monks would feel guilty because they didn’t see it, Wuya… might react, but Chase would know better.  
Jack has a schedule to visit the man. Jack tells Chase all about his new and upcoming project, and the centuries-old warlord is always interested in expanding his knowledge, so he listens. Jack just said to Chase that he would try to kill him, but Jack dies instead; Chase would see through that in a second.  
No. If Jack wants to disappear, then he has to make it believable.  
If Jack wants to be killed and make it believable for Chase, then Chase Young has to kill him.  
Jack smiles as he feels his plan taking shape.  
Little kids cartoons are playing. It’s morning already.  
The albino looks for the control, and when he can’t find it, he just leaves the T.V. on and goes to his lab.  
Jack drops his empty cup on the floor not caring where it might end up. He smiles as he looks at his lab, it has grown in size and projects, but it wasn’t enough yet.  
Everywhere he looks at his lab he feels a mixture of pride and hunger. He wants more, he wants a challenge. But maybe, he is in front of a challenge, Jack has merely to rise to the occasion. To build something, to create a plan, to impress Chase Young, and, more importantly, to prove the boundaries of his genius.  
“It can’t be a robot…” Jack says out loud and immediately covers his mouth. No one can know what he is planning.  
But whatever he makes, it can’t be a robot.  
It can’t be magic either, a powerful mage like Chase would see through it before fake-magic Jack can even say ‘hi.’  
Chase needs to believe that the imposter is Jack, which means it has to be alive, and it has to be the closest Jack can make to a human -not human looking but an actual human being.  
And then Jack has to send it to die.  
The young man feels sick at the thought.  
Jack moves through his lab picking up pieces he can use, pointing others for his Jack-bots to dismantle for later use.  
He needs to make a clone, then teaches him to be him, and then sent it to die.  
There are plenty of materials to make the machines he needs but not the biological component.  
Jack massages his head in the same way he sees Chase do to keep headaches away and tries to think how to get the materials without looking strange.  
Jack can get anything he wants. He had been buying and selling on the black market for quite some time, but he knows how rumors work. And if he doesn’t buy his usual and instead buys stem cells in bulk, then people will talk. Chase might hear the rumors which would make his plan useless.  
With that thought, Jack drops everything.  
Chase Young has a real all-seeing eye, he doesn’t need rumors, and Jack needs to talk to that man now.  
“I’m leaving!” Jack informs his minions who hurry to offer their master breakfast, clean clothes instead of pajamas, goggles, his jacket, his helipad, boots and more. Jack picks what he can and rushes out.  
He takes no time on fixing his helipad over his long coat. He carries his boots in one hand and a protein bar in his mouth.  
Jack leaves through a window, and Jack-bot carrying a large black summer hat, follows its master. It’s master happily takes it, since he forgot sunscreen and he doesn’t want to look like lobster in twenty minutes.

Jack needs to use the momentum of his ideas before he loses all motivation.  
Jack finished his protein bar, rescued his hat twice, putted on his boots, and finished the outline for his master plan.  
At the end, he has arrived to the land of Nowhere.  
The goth gracefully lands at the entrance of Chase’s lair, but he doesn’t turn off the helipad.  
The door opens faster than Jack expected it to, and he hurries entering right before the door could squeeze him. He looks back and smiles, enjoying his little triumph and softly lands a second time.  
“The hat is new.” Chase points out, and Jack, surprised, steps back and trips over his own feet.  
“The tripping is old,” Chase smirks and slowly walks towards Jack, curious about what the young man has to say. Chase stops as he sees Jack’s face cover in different shades of pink and red; it looks like when Jack was a teen and became embarrassed beyond all possible points.  
Jack sometimes visits unannounced and without thinking. the young man claims that thinking gets in the way of inspiration. Those days Jack would come in his pajamas, and with his hair unbrushed. Like Jack now. But Chase had never seen Jack in such a hurry that he neglects to protect himself from the sun.  
Maybe the only real act of self-care his little fanboy indulges on.  
“The hat is new,” Chase repeats because he believes it is a detail worth mentioning twice.  
“I got it for Christmas,” Jack says as he stands and fixes his clothes, feeling strangely self-conscious. Chase had seen him in pajamas before, not with the hat, but that wasn’t that important.  
Jack was shocked that Chase was at the entrance. Which could only mean one out of two things: one, Chase was waiting for him -not anyone more significant because Chase would not allow him to enter if he was expecting someone. Or two, Chase was ‘pacing’ which means moving around and checking everything is at its best. Either possibility was incredibly flattering.  
“I didn’t think you would come today,” Chase says, and Jack blushes under his sunburns. Most people wouldn't feel complimented by such little commentary, but Chase was thinking about him and was preparing.  
Jack felt honored.  
“Really? Considering our last talk, you should have expected me earlier.” Jack smiles.  
“It’s not even nine. For you, that is around six AM.” Chase reaches a respectable distance between Jack and him.  
“You should have expected me three minutes after I left yesterday! So I can tell you how wrong this is! And stupid.” Jack crosses his arms feeling like that was an insult.  
“I wouldn't have opened the door,” Chase says in a matter of fact and moves away. Jack follows him and continues to speak.  
“I went home, ate some pudding, and watched T.V. Then when the T.V. got bad I thought ‘there are zero rules for this stupid game of the great and powerful Chase Young?’” Jack explains a little too fast.  
“Oh. You don’t have rules.” Chase answers and feels a little disappointed that Jack was still stuck on ‘how do you play this game?’ mindset.  
“Oh. I know! I guess that much. What is the point of letting me do my stuff if you are going to decide what I can do for me? I know. But I mean you. What rules you have.” Jack blurs out and sees the little head tilt Chase does; a new habit he picked somewhere.  
“I have no rules,” Chase answers with a tone that sounds like he could laugh at the implications of him being grounded by rules.  
“That. That’s going to be a problem.” Jack says, and Chase turns, not surprised or worried.  
“Is it?” He mocks Jack like the young man had any power or saying.  
“Fuck Y-. Game. Yeah, fuck this game!” Jack prays that Chase is in a good mood.  
“I didn’t realize you wanted to die, but since you so gracefully hid -so well- your misdirect anger I’ll let it pass,” Chase says not bothering to hide his laughter.  
The young man has a way to heighten his mood.  
They reach the dining room. The table completely cover with breakfast foods. Jack knows that Chase already had breakfast, and he smiles at the gesture. The young man looks down feeling, even more, worn out by the situation -or the lack of sleep and food.  
“I’m human.” Jack blurs out, and he can feel the atmosphere change around his idol.  
“I know,” Chase says softly before understanding what Jack means. The immortal tries to find the right words to assure Jack, but Jack had always had the faster mouth.  
“I don’t want to die okay. I just don’t want to. I don’t want to live to one hundred Chase, but I don’t want to die. Not now. Not yet. Not. Not like this.” Jack starts, and he can’t make his mouth stop and his eyes sting from tears he can’t hold back. “I won’t die like this! I have” survived so much. “Everyone! Everyone thought I would be dead by now!” I don’t want them to be right! “Chase-” Jack's throat feels hot.  
“You won’t.” ‘die’ Chase wanted to finish, but it would be a lie, Jack will eventually die.  
“I don’t want you to kill me.” Jack finally says, and he feels like he has said it all. Jack looks at the table feeling too exposed, and he doesn’t turn to see Chase. He doesn't know what would it be worst, Chase somewhat affected by his words and pity him even more. Or if Chase doesn’t care at all.  
“I won’t. I promised you that is not how it will end.” The immortal knows better than to make that type of promises, but he is surprised how sure he feels when he says it.  
Jack lets his worry out with his breath and sits on the table. He tries to breathe; he is a grown man, he can’t just tear up every two days like a child.  
“Thanks… for everything.” Jack says and starts stuffing thing in his mouth. He only wanted to make sure Chase wouldn’t use the magical eye. Instead, he just made his plan harder.  
And, he just shared a little too much with the man. He knows how Chase feels about intimacy and quote in quote emotional leverage.  
Yet. The only thing that Jack could think, is that Chase promised Jack’s life. After years of animosity and their odd uncoordinated relationship, Chase Young promised to not be a threat to Jack Spicer.  
A tiger pushes a plate of pancakes away from Chase and closer to Jack. Chase knew that Jack is beloved by his warriors, and even those who dislike Jack did not want to see the young man so exposed.  
“You knew,” Chase speaks, and Jack brings more pancakes to his plate and mouth simultaneously. Chase waits, and he knows his servants didn’t randomly decide that the floor needs cleaning immediately.  
Jack doesn’t answer. But Chase needs to know that Jack feels somewhat safe with Chase, alike the millennium-old warrior feels near the youth.  
He knew that the potential harm that they could bring to each other was exponentially different, but Chase likes to think that they have built some trust.  
“How do your cats even cook?” Jack tries to change the subject before he cries because that is what he does. He is an angry crier, a happy crier; he is just a crier.  
“You knew I wouldn’t kill you.” Chase had to admit that a long time ago he might have, only for the fun of it. No, just five or six years had passed since then, but that time had brought noticeable change. Chase shifts feeling more uncomfortable as Jack’s big rubies eyes begin to blur by his crocodile tears. He only knows two ways to deal with Jack’s cries, ignore him or mock him, and he feels both options are slightly inappropriate.  
“I. I didn’t, and the breakfast is great. Now I know. Thanks for the food.” Jack says between breaths, and Chase nods and ignores the fact that tears roll down of Jack’s sunburnt cheeks.  
The warrior has seen Jack cry so many times, but this time it felt so out of place.  
Jack cried once because he was startled at his own home by the microwave.  
Chase tells himself that those dramatic tears are details on Jack’s face, like dimples on smiles, and that Jack would cry when he was assured that Chase wouldn’t hurt him means nothing.  
“The game.” Jack continues because he couldn’t wait until he stops crying.  
“Yes.” Chase answers and he can feel the closest to a stink eye from his warriors.  
“I can’t surprise you if you spy on me! You can’t use your eye thing.”  
“Understandable” Chase agrees.  
“Is not fair if you prepare. You need to act like you didn’t ask me. If I don’t act weird, then there is no reason for you to prepare for a secret plot.” Jack continues, and Chase takes a moment to think before nodding.  
“It seems fair.” He had to agree even though it would be hard not to prepare.  
“I won’t touch dragons or any of the soup that is left. I know, no rules for me, but just in case. When you are wondering ‘what had crossed the mind of the mad genius Jack Spicer?’ You don’t have to worry about dragons.” Jack says and Chase nods.  
“So consider it.” Chase mocks, but there was a little too much truth in those words.  
“Pull back your punches. Not on my army or plans but me. Just don’t push me. I’m fragile!” Jack says again, and he hopes he sounds reasonable and mature regardless of his teary eyes.  
“I know. Spicer. You were right. This is a game. I’m going to had fun, you’ll have some level of healthy stress but try to have fun too.” Chase admits, and he can see Jack relaxing.  
“Wow. That’s the nicest you had been to me - Wait. Are you trying to comfort me? Ha. I should cry more often!” Jack chuckles and giggles somehow at the same time.  
“It is not humanly possible for you to cry ‘more often.’” Chase mocks.  
“I would need to drink more water.” Jack ponders on the science. On how often does he cries, his clone will need to cry just as often.  
“You look like you need water now,” Chase says with a smirk, and Jack remembers that he is very sunburn. He hasn’t seen his face yet, but he can feel his skin burning.  
“I need a new face,” Jack says as he tries to touch his nose with his index finger, but the contact proves too much.  
“I would pay for it. Since I had to look at you so often.”  
“Ha. Ha. Very funny.” Jack says, and a lioness brings Jack a bowl full of a yellowish clear gelatin.  
“Make everyone a favor and apply that on your face. It’s somehow getting redder.” Chase tells him, and Jack does it without asking what it is. The albino feels the cooling relief touching his skin, and he smiles.  
The tension disappears like it was never there. The cats finish with they redundant tasks, and Jack and Chase talk until the sun is low enough for the albino to return to his home.  
Everything feels normal again.  
Jack leaves his hat even though Chase warns him that the cats would destroy it, but Jack only struggles his shoulders and says that the wind of the night would steal it anyway.  
The flight back home is bizarrely silent. It felt like everything underneath the sky was death and Jack felt a terrible thing of his stomach for just one second. 

Jack knew had taken more than he could handle when he accepted the challenge But now Chase referred to it as a game. Now, Jack could look at his situation with a different perspective.  
If this is a game, then Jack could win.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know what you guys think :)


	3. Playing the Part

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack and Chase gossip a bit before starting their game.

Keeping up appearances was harder than Jack expected it.  
The young man lands on the meditation gardens. He stretches once he is back on firm land and searches for Chase.  
The man in question is training a few miles away, but Jack recognizes the armored silhouette and the many figures attacking him.  
Jack yawns and takes off his helipad, and he sits next to it in case he needs to fly away for any reason. A giant tiger walks next to Jack and drops his head on Jack’s lap.  
“Wow! Okay.” The albino says as he starts caressing the large feline’s head. It was not a new thing for Chase’s cats to behave like spoiled cats, but it still took Jack by surprised whenever a large feline just cuddles him. The tiger pushes his head against Jack’s chest demanding more attention. Lately visiting Chase also means petting centuries old warriors.  
“My fingers are tired!” Jack explains, but the tiger ignores him and continues to demand Jack’s fingers to work on his fur. The young man sighs and starts massaging the cat’s head. The feline relaxes as the slender fingers expertly work the muscles on his face.  
“I’m tired.” Jack pouts, but the tiger only gets himself more comfortable. It has been almost a whole month since the strategy game had started. Plotting against Chase Young while acting natural had slowly taken its toll on the young man, but his plan was finally ready...or as prepared as it could ever be.  
Jack was ready to start.  
He just needs a reason to act 'oddly' so he can buy his clone a little of error room for his first field mission tomorrow. Tomorrow when jack takes the place of Jack, and the genius needs to pray that Chase won’t see the imposter for what it is.  
Jack can’t risk his life for a game, which means he needs to get himself out of the game by all means possible. And last time he checked, faking his death was not against the rules.  
But at the moment all he has to do is look sleep deprived, so if jack, the clone, does something strange it can be blamed on the lack of sleep.  
The young man yawns loudly, and the tiger looks at his pasty face.  
It is easy to appear sleep deprived when he is sleep deprived.  
“You are so selfish!” Jack tells the tiger, but he is back caressing the warrior made animal once again.  
“That’s because you spoil them,” Chase explains standing next to Jack, opposite to where the helipad is, and he doesn’t mind when he sees the young man reach for the helipad and scream in surprise.  
The tiger stands, bows to his master, and leaves.  
“Nice kicks. Nice normal not preparing to had your world mess up and rock at the same time but excellence kicks!” Jack tries to laugh as he would typically, but he can feel sweat down his neck. Pretending everything is normal is harder than he thought it would be. But Chase is an expert at ignoring Jack’s odd behavior.  
“My form and attacks are always perfect. You are not wearing eyeliner.” Jack nods. But he stops and looks up at Chase with confusion.  
“No…you know I don’t dress up during big projects… but today I just didn’t feel like it. No, because I had any big projects coming… What you know does -I mean those days… when you don’t want to do anything…?” Jack smiles and acts confused. Even though, he knows the dark circles under his eyes look like blurred eyeliner.  
“I don’t know. I don’t like unproductive days. And you look awful, just looking at you makes me want to go take a shower.” Chase looks at the frown forming on Jack’s face, but the young man is too tired to fight and just lets the comment slide.  
“I always wonder who is practicing, you or are your warriors. ‘Cause being cats for that long has to mess up their human coordination!” Jack ponders while he stands up. He pulls his helipad over his shoulders and waits for Chase to choose a place to go.  
He secretly hopes for the lilies garden. He could use the mindless job of plucking petals or a little nap on the cold marble floor.  
“Both. I can’t stop training, and you are right… they are too used to being cats. I can’t stand it.” Chase informs him, and he looks at the tiger that was earlier behaving like a house pet.  
“Well, if there is someone that can pull off the old cat lady look and make it hot is you!” Jack says with a smile and Chase just glares. The dragon knows that Jack truly means it as a complaint, but it still displeases Chase.  
“...go away Spicer.” Chase sighs out, even though he would prefer to have a conversation with Jack over tea. He found something about bee-robots, and he would like an insight. But, Jack looks sickly pale even for him.  
“What? You are not an old lady! You are a powerful, perfect warrior. You could take over the world in an afternoon! But you like to fight giants cats instead. I did not mean any disrespect. Don’t send me away!” Jack implores, and Chase signals him to step back.  
Jack pouts and his crocodile tears seen ready to make an entrance.  
“You are too tired even to beg properly. And I don’t want to look at your face at the moment. It looks like at bad last minute Halloween costume. Go get some sleep; you are at your worst when sleep deprived.” Chase informs him and walks away ignoring Jack.  
“There is so much work at home!” Jack whines and sits back on the floor. He was surprised by someone pushing his back lightly, the albino turns to find the same tiger.  
“Okay. I’m leaving because no one wants me here! And I, Jack Spicer, won’t be used!” Jack storms off in his over the top fashion, not even sure if Chase is listening.  
The albino wishes he got to say ‘goodbye’ in a proper manner.  
He won’t see Chase in a month, and he wishes he could have shared just a few more moments with the man.

Jack falls asleep during the flieth, his helipad autopilot takes him home, and he wakes up in time to do the landing.  
The genius moves back to his lab and sees himself working on a project. He doesn’t try to hide. This jack was so focussing on his design he wouldn’t notice if his creator suddenly were to melt or other cliche clone death.  
There is another jack in the lab.  
The clone Jack created.  
A very alive clone. He looks like Jack, smells like Jack, even his thought process is very alike Jack’s. But jack, the two weeks old adult is only two weeks old, and all learning and teaching won’t give the clone the experience it needs.  
“How is he doing?” Jack asks from the door to the ‘original groups’ of Jack-bots, which are four robots who are aware of the situation. They only address Jack the creator and can differentiate between the original Jack and jack.  
“The experimental group had not yet recognized him as an imposter.”  
The rest of the robots, the experimental group, are not aware that their master had been replaced. They monitor their new master and report to the control group if they find anything odd.  
“If you guys can’t tell us apart, then no one can,” Jack whispers and moves away. His last four minions following him.  
“He seems to remember all of your past experiences and projects. He had the same bio-watch, and he fears the same enemies. He does what you said he will.”  
Jack nods.  
He manipulated his clone’s mind until he could set two orders that would feel like instinct. Alike fear and curiosity things that identified us living creatures. The clone has two rules that he should follow. The first one was a trial to see if it works.  
A small insignificant detail.  
The clone, when frustrated, would not touch the table.  
It was the only detail reported by the experimental team, but it was too small to suspect their master of being an imposter.  
The second order was environmental and would only surface under specific conditional stress.  
“Are you ready Master?” The leader of the control group asks, and Jack nods without looking away from jack.  
“Let’s go before I come to my senses and call the whole fucking thing off,” Jack whispers and follows his robots.  
The control groups take their master to a safe location, and proceed with step one; secured original master.

 

The experimental group’s leader offers coffee to their master who takes it with a frown.

“...” jack drinks the black liquid without tasting it and continues with his project.  
The very young man works on the very delicate wire circuit of what soon would be a new supercomputer.  
He had been working on it for a while. jack knows he should start on the hardware at some point, but he needs to make sure this robot won’t betray him. Which won’t matter if Chase breaks his new robot, then it doesn’t matter what the level of artificial intelligence his computer has.  
He earnestly hopes that Chase somewhat appreciates all the effort he is putting into this.  
The goth drops his tools and slowly rotates his wrist, he wants to give up but he can’t yet. jack wonders why he is so fixed in building a robot to fight Chase -it won’t help, Chase will destroy whatever jack throws at him.  
jack stares at the machine a moment too long like something was wrong, just barely out of place.  
“Whatever…” jack says to no one in particular and returns working on his robot. It takes him two more days to finish, and two days and three minutes to noticed that he messed up. The software he had been working won’t be compatible with any design jack has…  
The genius moves away from the machine too tired to be mad.  
The jack-bots take their master to shower and eat.  
And as instructed the jack-bots remind jack that he needs to meet with Chase Young, as he does it every week.  
“Okay.” jack says and slowly makes his way out of the house, but before he could leave his robots are calling him back.  
The modified albino hears the intruder alert, and he groans, he doesn’t want to deal with anyone at the moment. Still, he moves towards the lab as he tries to think who is breaking into his house this time.  
jack isn’t surprised or worry when he sees Wuya sitting on his desk. He looks at the woman alive in flesh and blood -a little less blood than need it if her pale face was to take into account. Her natural radiant dark skin looks like a muddy paste.  
“Wuya.” jack drags the name as he already grows tired of their encounter. The witch looks at the young man and laughs.  
“Wow, I thought you couldn’t look any more like a ghost! Are you even alive at this point!” Wuya laughs at her jokes and ignores jack’s lack of reaction.  
“What you want?” the genius asks because he doesn’t have the time or energy to deal with Wuya. Though he almost wants to mention that she doesn’t look pretty at the moment herself, but who has the time?  
“Oh, you don’t have to be that cold! jackie~ especially when what I want is something you want!” The Heylin witch smiles and a robot moves next to her and offers her a smoothie. She stops her monologue to look at jack, obvious question on her face.  
“Drink it! It will get your blood flowing.” jack explains, and he takes one offered by another jack-bot.  
They drink the smoothies in silence.  
“I heard you started a new project…” Wuya tries from a different angle, and she hides her excitement of jack working with clones and the possibility of having a stack of beautiful young bodies in stock for her convenience. But jack thinks of the supercomputer that he spends over two weeks building, which he can’t use.  
“That was a huge failure. Maybe I would try again when I’m not uh dying.” The clone answers to the wrong question, but Wuya only hums satisfied that jack is not giving up the project.  
“A wu will soon be activated. An exceptional Wu~” Wuya smiles and jack glares at her. All Wus are very special for Wuya, she wants them all. However, the witch had somehow gotten her body back -she needs to fight in the next showdown.  
“Whatever! Same rules!” jack informs the woman who just smiles.  
“Same rules~” She playfully repeats with a tone that makes jack wonder why is he even doing deals with that woman. Wuya’s magic is too weak to fight the monks these days, so she borrows jack’s weapons under two conditions. She won’t use them against him, and she will be his informant.  
As time passed and jack got more robots to blend anywhere and everywhere, Wuya loses her utility, but jack doesn’t have the heart to stop the deal.  
No, instead he is just waiting for an excuse to break the deal He knows he won’t need to wait long, Wuya will eventually break her only rule during combat.  
“I need to go, so lock up the lab after you are done.” jack says and flies away with more energy.  
But the smoothie’s magic only lasted him until he reaches the entrance of Chase’s lair.  
The small walk to the throne room felt like a marathon, and the sight of the warlord reading a book felt like the best price.  
“Thank you!” jack says sincerely. Chase Young looks away from his book and lifts an eyebrow to question the young man.  
“I saw you, and now I feel better.” jack explains and Chase rolls his eyes as hard as he can.  
“Well, I see you… and I think the zombies are coming. Did you rest at all since the last time I sent you away?” Chase asks and closes his book.  
Chase stops and looks at jack. The young man looks awful and smells more like machines and burnt metal than human. His lips were dry and covered on little red lines from splitting so often. And his eyes a little dull and heavy. But what worries the warlord was the smell that was lacking. jack didn’t smell like his. Unintentionally, jack acquired the scent of Chase’s home. If other predators were to encounter jack, then they would know that jack belongs to Chase Young. The dragon never meant to marked jack as his, but after years of visits, the fanboy got himself bathed on Chase’s scent.  
“No, no really, or at least not that I remember. What day was then and what day is today…?” jack asks, and Chase pities the human.  
Not sure what amount of self-experimentation would it take to cover Chase’s scent so well.  
“You know, giving the circumstances, I think you might have planned yourself to possible death,” Chase says with a smirk, and he can’t help but feel flatter by the effort than any of jack’s pretty. jack had reached a new state of tiredness. A state Chase didn’t think it was possible, a new state because he had never worked as hard or as long or pull as many all-nighters for any other project.  
“Let’s not talk about that. My head hurts, I think my all hurts and I had barely moved!” jack whines as he moves to sit on the steps of the throne. Close enough to be heard, and far enough to not touch the other man.  
He remembers that this is a safe distance.  
“Is called atrophy. Signs of early aging.” Chase answers and jack glares a little.  
“And who’s fault would that be? No, let’s not talk about that. Gossip. Gossip, I’ll go. First, Wuya is excited about the next Wu. She got her body back! And is borrowing a lot of stuff from my lab.” jack whispers because that is the right way to gossip.  
“Wuya being excited about a Wu, any Wu, is not news.” Chase declares and waits for more, but jack is not talking.  
“That’s all I had. I had been in my lab for almost the whole month, no. Wait. I have been in my lab for almost two fucking months! And I only leave to come here! That’s all I have.” jack explains irritated.  
“Still, how can you called yourself an evil genius if that’s all the information you collected.” Chase teases, and jack crosses his arms and whispers curses.  
“Well, what ‘information’ you had? Warlord.” jack asks angrily but still curious.  
“Oh, little things. Nothing important, little insignificant things like Kimiko buying a pregnancy test.” Chase says and as he expected jack’s mouth falls open as he tries to assimilate the information.  
“That’s some hot gossip! What are you gonna do?” jack asks and questions rush to his previously very tired brain.  
“Nothing. It is not my businesses.” Chase declares.  
“Shit. Is she gonna keep fighting or training? You know if she is knocked out or just checking? Does Rai know? Rai is the father, right?”  
“I don’t think she is pregnant. No chance on her energy or her hormones.” Chase ponders, and jack lets out a sigh of relief.  
“Good, I don’t think she would want a baby right now.”  
“She is very focused on her training.” Chase agrees.  
“But you know if it would be Rai?” jack asks, but the question only makes Chase confused.  
“Who else?” The warlord asks, considering there are not many choices, only Rai and Clay. And he doesn’t take Clay or Kimiko as double timers.  
“Anyone? They travel all the time! And she is hot. If I was that hot and have the opportunity. I would be a total slut!” jack nods at his statements.  
“Says the virgin.” Chase offers, and jack’s face turns pink.  
“I had been busy with work, and I look like a baby of a vampire and ghost … which would also be a correct description of my parents’ parental technics.” jack stops a little hurt by his analogy.  
“Don’t try to distract me with your parental issues. Taunting you for your lack of sex life is far more fun.” Chase laughs and ignores the glares jack throws at him.  
“You don’t even care. You are too old to care!” jack points out, and Chase internally acknowledges it. jack is right Chase doesn’t care.  
“But you care.” Chase continues to bully the younger man, and jack pouts.  
“Get it out of your system!” jack finally gives in, and he pouts and glares while Chase pokes at his issues as entertainment.  
The rest of the afternoon goes fast.  
The next day goes even faster after jack decided that he would die if he doesn’t get some sleep.  
And as soon as his body was on his bed jack fell asleep for two whole days.  
He wakes up at the noise of his Shen gong wu alarm screaming from all directions.  
The young man wakes up in panic and jumps out of bed trying to size the situation only to groan when he understands that is nothing.  
“Shut Up already!” With that command, the alarm stops and jack runs to his bathroom to clean himself.  
He brushes his teeth as he contemplates not going to the showdown. He knows he doesn’t have many chances of winning anything but new bruises, and he already feels awful as it is. Definitely better after sleeping, but still not ready to get into a fight with martial arts masters… not that his body had ever been prepared to fight martial arts masters.  
Also, he has a feeling that urges him not to go.  
However, his mind is already made. He hurries to dress up and put some sunscreen on while all the jack-bots try to shove food touching his face.


	4. Too dead to play

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: There is a little gore in this chapter. Also, a little sad.

“GO!” jack sends his jack-spies a few miles ahead. Pre-programmed past experiences had taught jack that he should let his robots scout the perimeter for danger and information before he reaches his destination.  
The little habit has saved him more than once.   
The genius had tried to keep his new robots a secret since most people would tease him about it because ‘it should have been obvious, and it is hard to believe that it took you so long to come with the most basics of strategies.’ That was what Chase Young said.  
jack pouts at the memory. It wasn't his memory, but it felt so real.   
When jack arrives, most of the main players were already waiting.   
The redhead looks at Wuya who stands tall with her cocky smile. She looks much stronger than the last time he saw her. The memory is blurry but jack credited to being sleep deprived at the time. All of his most recent memories seem to be blurry. The young man smiles at the older woman. He looks at his biotech armor that Wuya wears and whistles.   
The woman looks at jack quickly. She didn’t pose or try to get any more flattery. Or happily show her quick wit to the albino. She just looks away quickly like she wasn’t spoke to.  
jack saw her face. He saw the last specks of guilt Wuya possess exposed for only a moment, and that’s how jack knew that Wuya would betray him today.  
“Where is it?!” Raimundo screams, his voice reminds jack of where he is and what he came to do.  
“Around here! Could you calm down? We just got here!” Jogo says as he draws a circle on the dirt, and tries to concentrate.  
“Why so very fast Raimundo? Don’t you want to see your land of mothers?” Omi asks as innocently as the teen could fake.  
“How are you getting worse at speaking? How is that even possible?” Raimundo asks already annoy and ready to go home.  
“Leave him alone!” Kimiko interferes, and the whole group goes silent.   
The tension is massive and fresh, and it makes jack smile. The monks are at their weakest when they are fighting each other. The albino giggles at their misfortune like it were meant to be his entertainment. With a bright grin, jack turns to looks for Wuya, sure that with a small partnership he could win over the monks. But Wuya isn’t longer an option.  
jack curses under his breath at the timing in which the witch decides to go solo. The genius tries to calculate his chances of actually winning the showdown before Dojo or Wuja find the Wu when Chase Young appears from thin air.  
The presence of the warlord always makes everyone wary. But what brothers jack was the four large felines that growl behind their master. Chase only brings his warriors with him for two reasons; when he is bored, and he wants to bother people with his witty, mean comments -and of course he needs an audience. Or when he wants to be sure he won’t lose.   
And since Chase hasn’t insulted anyone in the last ten seconds, jack guesses is the second one.  
The young man wonders if Chase Young would help him if he asks.  
A jack-spy reports a code ‘chili,' which means Hannibal Roy Bean is nearby.   
The albino moves with new purpose and value, he hurries to share the information with Chase Young before any of the Warlord's minions can.  
No one pays attention to jack running from his place to Chase Young’s side.   
The warlord himself didn’t think it was anything of importance, and when jack pulls on his arm and whisper on his ear Chase was merely surprised that he didn’t hear the little-worn asking to ‘team up.’  
“The old evil is lurking~” jack whispers with a grin on his face. Chase raises an eyebrow questioning the information.  
“I had visible jack-spies, invisible ones, and mosquito cameras everywhere! I get reports of anything and everything that happens on a ten miles radius! By now I had better and more complete maps than Google could ever dream!” jack explains happily, and he knows he said something right when Chase doesn’t send him away.  
“What about any flora or fauna? Do you have every creature accounted for?” Chase asks, and after a moment of doubt, the young man shrugs his shoulders.  
“I could if I wanted to.” jack answers to the weird command, and Chase looks at Dojo and Wuya but neither seem to be able to locate the Wu.  
The warlord considers his next move, as he doesn’t want anyone but himself to take possession of the Wu. And with a heavy sigh, the millennium-old man says one word.  
“Fine.” Chase redundantly agrees to the unspoken question, and jack smiles like the fool he is. However, jack’s mind is always ready to ruin his fun, his brain asks ‘why?’   
But before jack could make his questions vocal, he came to the answer.  
“The Wu is fucking moving!” The genius says surprise and suddenly looking everywhere like the Wu could pop up in front of him at any minute.   
It is not only moving, but it must not hold a specific shape as either Wuya or Dojo hadn’t tried to describe it. More importantly, it can’t be trace with magic, not even Chase Young or Hannibal Roy Bean had been able to find it.   
Therefore Chase needs a map, and everything and everyone accounted for.  
“This is going to be a cool one!” jack smiles and looks at Chase but the man doesn’t seem to agree or disagree.  
“We should make this special, not that it isn’t already special being able to work with you -it is truly a dream come true. No, it is a life goal to be able to work with you, even on a temporary basis. But I want it to be more special to the both of us, so we should get like a team name. What you think?” jack asks as he sends the new command of searching for all life forms to his robots.  
“I think your existence is an error of mother nature and humankind, but agreeing to work with you was my error. And I hate to err.” Chase answers and he sees jack’s smile shrink for a moment, but the young man simply lets the commentary go over his head.  
“Yeah...maybe a name might be a bit too much.” jack smiles and his watch lights up. Chase doesn’t understand the numbers on the small screen, but he can clearly read jack’s expression.  
“What is wrong?” Chase asks.  
“NOTHING!” jack lies. Before Chase could further question the albino, a raven lands on his shoulder to tell him what jack already did ten minutes ago.  
“If there something that I hate more than your incompetence, is you trying to lie!” Chase says as he sends his minion away. jack visibly trembles, and then he nods.  
Chase can’t help to smile at that, and he does love when jack spicer shows his backbone.  
“There are too much life forms to had them all accounted in such short notice and without enough robots available...” jack reports.  
“Then call reinforcements immediately, and I’ll make sure you had enough time.” Chase states like it were the most simple thing. jack looks at the man for a moment, like he thinks Chase is going to remember to insult him in any minute, but he doesn’t so jack rushes with his machines.  
“It would take 30 minutes for them to get here, and from 1 hour to 2 for the analysis to be completed.” jack says after making some calculations.  
Chase nods and jack waits for more commands or to be sent away, but neither happens.  
It takes only fifteen minutes for the monks to collectively give up on waiting for Dojo to explain himself, and start asking Wuya and Chase for answers.  
It takes the monks five minutes to understand that neither of the Heylin will answer their questions. This brings discomfort to them, as they are used to a more talkative Wuya and even Chase.  
jack grew bored of waiting twenty minutes ago, but he busied himself with calculations and the games on his phone.  
The albino was getting more comfortable by using a tiger, fluffy Noah, as a chair when the screen on his wristwatch started beeping. He reads the information and hums to himself.  
“What it says, Spicer?” Chase asks, and jack answers like the answer meant nothing.  
“I sent the jack-spies to observe the ecosystem and count all living being that around. But they only found one Noron- Noro-onhomys Noronhomys, a fancy name for a rat! And they only found one. Which is odd.” jack tells Chase, but the man doesn’t react to jack’s words but to Wuya’s movements.  
“Where?” Chase asks as he signals something to the tiger jack is sitting on.  
“2.3 miles, east from here.” jack answers and without a warning the tiger he had been sitting on starts running.  
“Noah, you dump!” jack cries as he struggles to hold his balance. He doesn’t even feel bad when he pulls the tiger’s fur for leverage.   
The monks notice the Heylins moving, and they follow by foot. Raimundo gets ahead using his power over the wind, and ignores Clay’s plead to ‘stick together.’  
The tiger who carries jack runs without hearing the young man’s cries to stop. Wuya is the first one to find the rat, and she pounds on the ground for it like a cat. The rat squeaks as it tries to get away.  
“Why are we chasing a rat?!” Kimiko asks as she sends a fireball in the rodent’s direction.  
“STOP THAT!” Dojo screams and hurries to put off the fire.  
“Why?” Kimiko asks as she tries to think of another way to get the rat.  
“We need to get it alive. It very, very, very important that we capture the rat alive!” Dojo explains as he tries to capture the rodent.  
“That really goes against my upbringing,” Clay says, but he still tries to capture the little creature by building an earth fence around it. But the rat jumps over it with ease.  
“What an embarrassment to the past Xiaolin monks; their descenders can’t even catch a rat,” Chase says as he looks the whole situation unfold at his feet, he turns to look at jack who has a huge grin on his face. The eyes of the youth follow only Chase as he waits to see his idol make his move.   
With his small audience, Chase feels a little cockier and he smiles before teleporting on the center of everything.   
Everyone jumps back and observe the warlord, but their attention is quick robbed by the large rodent trapped on Chase’s gloved hand.  
“You are supposed to be dead,” Chase tells the rat before squeezing.  
“PLEASE DON’T” Wuya implores as she shamelessly falls to her knees.  
“Oh, you are going to beg,” Chase says, amusement mixed in his tone. He searches for jack who looks torn between who to root for, but the young uncharacteristically chooses to be quiet. Maybe a sign of maturity.   
jack looks at the ground, and he tries to block the sound of Wuya crying. It shouldn’t matter to him -she wouldn’t help him if the situations were reversed; she would betray him as well. She was already planning to betray him. She betrayed him first, and he owes her nothing.   
“You don’t need it. But I DO!” Wuya cries, and for a moment her ugly cries are enough to distract Chase.   
A bird flies in the scene aiming for Chase’s head, the warlord dodges easily, and he doesn’t even blink when Hannibal Roy Bean jumps from the bird and attacks Chase. The man laughs at the attacks of his old master, and when he feels another attacker from behind, he jumps out of the way to had Wuya’s attack collide against Hannibal.  
“Too late!” Chase says as everything plays as he anticipated. Neither Wuya or Bean are strong enough to fight him, and they had failed at their ambush. The monks are too stunned to do anything on time and Dojo would prefer for Chase to keep the Wu than anyone else. And jack, he comes closer to Chase, as a moth flies to light, to see his idol destroy his enemies last hopes.  
Chase Young was distracted and he misses a crucial detail; the rat. The animal fights for its freedom and bites the hand that holds him. The teeth didn’t even nick Chase skin, but he opens his hand out of reflex, and the rat jumps out.  
The Xiaolin monks compose themselves and understand that it doesn’t matter what the rat means, but if the three big evils want to kill it then they must save it. Wuya and Hannibal busy themselves attacking Chase, while Bean’s bird and jack’s robots follow the rat.  
“What?” jack says as he sees his robots move without him giving them an order. A quick check on their system lets the genius know that there is a second control. He knows Wuya must have stole control it.  
Chase hisses at the deafening vibration of Wuya’s sonar gun, a product of Spicer’s creativity, the warlord makes a mental note of forbidden jack from making weapons like that one. Hannibal takes full advantage of Chase’s temporal sensorial lost, and he attacks as often and as dirty as he is able to. The monks throw every long-distance attack they can think of.   
jack takes a big breath. He can’t overtake the other control from where he is. Since both are master controls, he needs to deactivate the other control manually. Against his survival instinct, he leaves the tiger, who joins the battle as soon as jack is no longer on the way, and he sneaks inside the battlefield.  
Chase growls and transforms into his dragon shape, he calls his warriors except for the one protecting jack.   
It’s much easier to shred flesh with claws, and he enjoys the cries from Hannibal as he forces the old rotten Bean to back off.   
Even as the worst fighter on the Heylin side, jack is very proud of his ability to slide from a place to place mostly unnoticed. Chase did mention that was because no one cared to notice jack. But jack was still proud of his sneaking skills.  
Wuya felt jack jump over her before the albino had even performed the act. Her first instinct was to attack, and she turns with her sonar gun pointed at jack. The young man sees the gun, and he captures her wrist and points the gun down. In a single motion, he pushes Wuya to the ground without releasing her hand. He smiles as he sees his training finally pay off. jack doesn’t notice that Wuya never pulled the trigger because he is bleeding.  
It all happened too fast.   
Chase had just tilt his fight with Hannibal in his favor, Omi had been able to hit him on the right side of his face with a block of ice. Irritated, Chase decided to end the fight. He chooses to get rid of Wuya first; he attacked her with intent to kill except that Wuya was on the ground and jack was looking at the claws buried deep in his stomach.  
jack’s body tense at the moment of the strike. But all the resistance his muscles meant nothing as the sharp claws go through him like he wasn’t there. The three lower claws teared his stomach open and all the acid spills over his organs, and they begin to slowly dissolve. His sternum was shattered by the dragon’s claws and his diaphragm torn useless, with the diaphragm unable to help the lungs to contract jack is unable to breathe. He looks at the claw resting inside of him, nestled in his heart, and his tears fall like they have done countless times before. jack slowly looks up. His lips are blue. He looks at Chase Young on his dragon shape standing very still.  
The monks stop their attack and they run to help -to do something. Omi is the first one to apply pressure to the wound, his hands tremble at the sight of all that red. “It smells worse than it looks,” Omi whisper to jack but the albino doesn’t look at him. He only looks at Chase.  
Kimiko is on the phone screaming at the person on the other line to tell her what to do.  
Wuya is screaming as she tries to desperately clean the blood that had fallen on her.   
Chase looks at jack, his lips are blue, his eyes are losing their light, and his legs do not longer sustain him.  
Clay holds jack. First, he helps him stand but in less than a second Clay was the only thing keeping jack up.  
Raimundo tries to keep jack awake, responsive. He asks him questions, the monk jokes and when jack doesn’t response Raimundo raises his voice and ignores his tears.  
jack is not sure what is happening around him, only that everything is foggy and that Chase is looking at him like they would never see each other again. It was then when it hit him. jack won’t see Chase again. It was over, so he stays with his eyes open regardless of the pain and dizziness. That man, Chase Young would be the last thing he sees.  
Three minutes passed, and jack’s brain has suffered irreparable damage. Jack’s mind is officially passed any salvation. “We had to put him down, and give him CPR until and try to stop the bleeding, and wait for help. If it didn’t hit his stomach, he has a chance!” Kimiko informs everyone, and people move to help. Raimundo says he knows CPR, and Omi whispers to jack that “everything would be okay.”  
“He is gone,” Chase says.   
jack’s eyes are perfect crystals, and the warlord can see himself reflected on them, tears do not longer fall.  
“He can come back! I had seen people come back from worse, and jack won’t let death take him so easily. I’ll do the compressions.” Clay says as he tries to lower jack to the ground.  
“I hit his stomach. He is no longer bleeding internally because his blood has stopped circulating, he knew he was dead the moment …” Chase doesn’t finish that sentence. He doesn’t say anything else.  
The atmosphere quickly changes from denial to anger.  
“YOU ATTACK HIM!” Omi was the first one to scream as he tries to pull the body away from Chase. The monk is successful but when the body is pulled away from the claws a new wave of blood rushes out of the hole left under the young man’s ribs.  
The monks help Omi while insulting Chase like they had forgotten the strength of the man. Or maybe they are far more angry that they had ever been scared.  
Wuya says nothing and does nothing. She only stares at the blood puddle.  
“I’m so sorry,” Clay says to the body before he reaches to close jack’s eyes.  
“Don’t” Chase finally speaks. There is silence. Chase himself can’t believe he isn’t allowing for the monks to the respectful thing and close the eyes of the death. But jack die looking at him, no one else.   
jack live looking at Chase.  
“I’ll take him.” Chase states and he ignores the complaints of the monks. He teleports himself and the corpse away, leaving the monks to grieve.  
The palace was silence when Chase appears carrying the former jack spicer on his arms. The little blood trail they left as Chase walks to a room where he can lay the body respectfully was followed by the household servants.  
Chase picks one of the guest rooms and lays the body on the bed. He looks at the expensive bed covers as they become tainted with the dark red that still drips from the wound.  
“Spicer,” Chase calls even though he knows the boy didn’t have enough magic on him to hold to the realm of the living. Chase moves the head so the eyes would look at him. The warlord searches for the glee, love, and adoration that always shine in jack’s eyes, but those eyes are now dead.  
“jack,” Chase calls hoping that maybe the young man had enough regret on him to tied his spirit to the world of the living. But no one answers.  
Chase looks at his right hand which is covered in dried blood.  
“Please,” Chase whispers unsure of what would it accomplish.   
No one answers.  
Chase stays in silence, letting those lifeless eyes observe him while he thinks how could he apologize for breaking his promise to jack. The only promised he made to jack spicer.

jack’s blood grows cold on the Fernando de Noronha island.

The monks let themselves cry.   
Kimiko tries to talk to Wuya before leaving the island, but the witch quietly asks them to leave her alone.  
For once her voice is soft and exposed.   
For once the monks do as they are told.  
Wuya looks at the blood and repeats to herself that it’s jack’s.  
The woman looks around and when she can’t see anyone she lets herself cry.  
jack wasn’t like her son, he behaved like a child, and she had to play the role of the adult, but they weren’t mother and son. jack was her ally, never her first option but always an option. But, that was a part of their relationship she could survive without.  
jack was her friend.   
She would go to jack when she was at her weakest, and she would go to him when she was strong. They would fight, but jack always allowed her back. Even when she knew that jack couldn’t help her Wuya would search for him, because the boy would always listen. Because the lonely boy didn’t have anyone to guide him and Wuya didn’t have anyone else to trust her. They were each other’s last option, but they always chose each other first.  
Wuya lets silent tears fall down her face as she chokes her sobs before they leave her throat. The witch lowers her head to the fresh blood puddle, and she imagines that she is next to jack spicer’s body. That the idiot genius can still hear her, so she can say everything she didn’t say to him in life.  
“Thank you.” The witch whispers.  
Wuya lifts her head and cleans her face. She readies to stands up; there is a rat she must catch.  
“That was touching.” A voice mocks her from a tree. Hannibal smiles showcasing his yellow rotten teeth. “I didn’t know you care~,” The bean says as he jumps on the back of its minion.  
“Where were you?” Wuya ignores her raspy voice, tired from all the screaming.   
“Enjoying the spectacular. I never knew that Chase Young had grown so close to that kid. I think he was this close to breaking down there, next to you.” Hannibal chuckles. “It almost look like he might love him. Or as much as that frigid bastard can. Ha. Well, he did grow up to be quite a sight for sore eyes~”   
“It hasn’t been a day!” Wuya says disgustedly.  
“It hasn’t been three hours yet, his guts might still be warm if you search by his colon or dig in the ground. And you, you are ready to move on.” Hannibal points out.  
“What you want?” Wuya asks even though she knows the answer.  
“The same thing that you want; revenge,” Hannibal says, but Wuya doesn’t seem as pleased as he expects her to be. Instead, she walks off like Hannibal wasn’t talking to her.  
“Oh, and I thought you like jackie?” Hannibal plays.  
“He was a baby!” Wuya answers as she fights new tears from spilling over her face.  
The monster uses his vines until he is in front of Wuya.  
“You still want your power back, don’t you?” Hannibal asks incredulously of the witch new tactic of simply walking away from deals.   
“Yes. But last time I partner up with you we got our asses kicked, and gained nothing, I say I lost good weapons, a source of income, and more reliable ally. -jack spicer die!” Wuya stops at her words, but she picks up the pace, not ready to think about it now. She said her goodbyes; she can move on.  
Except she was planning to betray jack, he would never know, but that’s the fact.  
“Chase is startled. You saw him. I can tell his little fanboy death shocked him. Now is the time!” Hannibal says. Wuya considers fighting the bean but she doesn’t want to get hurt, not now.  
This is not the moment to make big decisions.   
Before she could answer the control she stole from jack starts beating.  
“That’s my ride.” The witch lies, and she looks at the screen to see what actually is. Wuya can barely keep her face calm when she sees a message from jack spicer. She hurries and calls one of the robots nearby to come and pick her up.  
“Leaving so soon. Don’t you had a rat to catch?” Hannibal asks.   
Wuya jumps on the jack-bot that has come for.  
“Do you know where that stupid rat is?” She doesn’t wait for an answer as the robot takes her away.

The woman waits until they are far enough and she is sure that she isn’t being followed to open the message.   
The little screen lights up, and jack appears. jack appears alive and okay, his eyes shine, his lips move, and there isn’t a large hole in his stomach.  
“Hi! It took you over twenty minutes to open my testament. So, fuck you! That’s just rude. Unless that you were like...crying in which case; I’m sorry...I guess.”   
The jack on the screen says, Wuya covers her mouth as she sees the screen change frames, jack looks the same he does. Correction. Jack looks the same as he did.   
It was filmed recently.  
“Wuya. This is a message for you!” The woman nods.   
“It should have been around three hours since I die. How cool is this? Wait let me do it again. If you had received this message, it means that I had been dead for over three hours. I’m sorry.” jack smiles brightly after imitating something he watched in a movie.   
“I’m not sure how long do you need ...or if you need time at all. I know you are not celebrating. If you are, then you are the worst. But I think you might cry. We didn’t always get along, mostly ‘cause you are a bitch, but ...we were friends Wuya. We were friends. So, I’m sorry for dying. I never meant to leave you alone so soon. I hope at least it was cool.” Wuya smiles and feels at ease for a moment. He knew that she cared, that she cares.  
“You are gonna need a good ally once I’m gone. Now that I’m gone. And You are gonna need friends. And by friends, I mean minions. So I gonna give you mine. Every jack-bot is from now on a Wuya-bot. Which it doesn’t sound as cool, and you won’t like them as much but is everything I got. There are two robot mechanics that can fix the broken stuff. And that’s all.” The jack on the screen says, and he awkwardly waits until the screen turns off.   
The witch stares at the screen a little longer, waiting for jack to say something, and just before she is ready to give up a second message arrives.  
“Just one more thing!” jack says with a smile. “I can’t give you all my good stuff for free. I need a favor.”


	5. Denial, Anger and Details

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No came to the training grounds, and Chase had broken every dummy he owns. Part of him wanted to understand that his warriors were affected by jack’s death, but he only wanted to ignore what had happened a little longer.   
> Denied what reality for a few more hours and pretend that jack was on his lab working.

No came to the training grounds, and Chase had broken every dummy he owns. Part of him wanted to understand that his warriors were affected by jack’s death, but he only wanted to ignore what had happened a little longer.   
Denied what reality for a few more hours and pretend that jack was on his lab working on his latest invention instead of laying on an old bed rapidly decomposing.   
“Master.” A voice called Chase, and it was like someone had ripped his chest open.  
“Noah.” Chase tastes the name like he had just learned it’s true meaning.  
“Master. A second warrior has fallen sick, and many are showing sudden health complains…” The tiger says.  
“You were supposed to watch him.” Chase accuses him. The animal looks at the floor, guilt pouring from him like he personally carved jack’s heart out, but he didn’t.  
“I was supposed to watch him.” The tiger agrees and sees his master move closer. Not a hunter or a strategist.   
“You were supposed to watch him! Because Jack always finds himself in danger. So I ordered you to protect him!” Chase says as anger grows within him until he doesn’t longer feel guilty.   
Anger burns inside his chest, and it doesn’t hurt anymore.  
“I was supposed to watch him. But master promised no danger would come to Jack.” Noah knew he spoke out of turn, and he wasn’t surprised when his Master attacked him.  
“Don’t say his name!” Chase attacks forward, his claws hit the floor breaking the tile. He turns and kicks his warrior as he places the blame on him.  
The warrior might have died if Chase was attacking with intent, but the man was attacking without a goal. He didn’t know what would he gain from this fight, but he craved destruction that he could control. Noah concentrates on dodging all the attacks and moves out of the training room. Chase follows leaving a path of destruction behind him. The man catches the animal and pins him down under his foot.  
The man isn’t sure what to say or do.   
Noah was Jack’s favorite, killing him won’t make anything better.  
Chase looks at the warrior trying to decide what to do when he feels an intruder.   
“Wuya…” Chase’s anger finds a new target, and he steps over the warrior on the floor. He whispers a spell and his clothes and armor readjust before he can face the witch. He doesn’t stop when he hears the mechanical ‘humm’ that accompanied her.

The witch stands tall, and without guilt, she wears a flashy black dress and a small black fur over her shoulders, her feet are bare like usual, but bracelets adorned her ankles. Over one hundred robots silently float behind her.   
“...you are wearing your armor?” The witch asks, and Chase ignores her raspy voice and puffy eyes. Because all the pretty jewels and the scandalous dress did not distract Chase from the fact that Wuya cried her eyes dry.  
Chase doesn’t answer, and the witch steps forward, the guards growl at her as warnings to stay in place.  
“I came for ...something.” Wuya says and Chase glares at her, but she continues before he can stop her “To take to Jack’s mother. Someone has to tell her, is what Jack. It should be easier to tell her what has happened if she can have something.”  
A new wave of emotions that Chase believed was long death within rip through his chest. He remembers Jack’s eyes light up everytime he talks about his mother next visit. Chase remembers Jack bright smile and hopeful voice. Everytime without fail. And every time that woman cancel Jack would shrink and become so small like he wants to disappear.   
All emotions are mask by anger.  
“That bitch? Wait a few months to see how long it takes her to notice.” Chase says and ignores the witch’s glare.  
“Take me to him!” The witch commands and the room goes silent. Any other occasion the warlord would have laughed at the witch delusions of power. Wuya demanding anything from him, but today Chase stays silence.   
“You took him from me,” Wuya whispers as if she were to say those words louder, she might break.   
Chase closes his eyes and nods, he turns and hears the bare feet of the witch follow him.   
Wuya follows in silence surprise that Chase had not only allow her inside his palace without searching her for weapons but wouldn’t give any further orders on how to deal with the robots. The Heylin witch breathes deeply and tries to keep emotions out of her face; Jack was right -Chase is distracted by his death. Wuya was worried when the plan asked her to use an emotional angle to enter the palace. It seems farcheted to try to keep Chase misled while the robots attack… She was surprised that the plan had worked so far but fearful that their luck would soon run out.   
“Here.” Chase stops in front of a room, a guest room -Wuya had used it before, and she feels sick.   
They open the door, and the smell escapes from the room in a hurry to cover the whole palace with the unique essence of death.  
The corpse lays on the bed, under new bedcover and dress in new clothes; black with red details, something Jack would approve.   
Wuya repeats the plan on her mind. She must keep Chase distract it for 15 minutes, and she knows she can. But she forgot that she would have to share the room with the body of her former friend. Her very last friend.   
“He almost looks handsome…” The witch says without thinking.  
“He looks awful,” Chase says with a small smile like he can think how would Jack react to his words. “I always thought he looked like the morning death, but it wasn’t until recently that I notice how much life are in his eyes,” Chase says, and quietly he corrects himself. “How much light were in his eyes.” He lets the witch stare at him; he knows he had never honestly expressed a liking towards Spicer. But the boy followed him and visited him, and before Chase could stop him, the warlord had become accustomed to his weekly visits. And he would wait for Jack to come and talk of things Chase might have never consider. And talk of his thoughts -Jack’s thoughts are like puzzle pieces that the boy always struggle to put together until he could form an idea.   
“He had so much life inside of him. It annoyed me,” Wuya says, and she knows that Chase would share the feeling.  
“He had so much to say all the time. I once let him talk to see when would he grow tired. I don’t know the answer -and never will, since I fell asleep before he was done talking.” Chase continues as he remembers when he asked Jack to explained how did satellites work.  
“I tried that too! But I had to hit him after two hours. I just couldn’t do it!” Wuya says as she tries to remember what was Jack talking about. Was it robots or space or Chase?   
“I want him back,” Chase says, and he surprises himself. The small sentence holds so much he didn’t want to accept. He had grieved so many people; he knows how painful it can be to miss someone.   
But it feels like he has never correctly considered it or maybe he forgot. It felt like it will never be okay again. It felt like he didn’t want to be okay. Perhaps he misunderstood how much it hurt. Because it hasn’t been a day and Chase would offer the witch anything she asks just to talk to jack for the rest of the day.   
But jack was gone…   
The witch looks away from the corpse to look at the warlord, and for the first time, she sees Chase Young hurt by something beyond his control.   
She stays silent.   
The plan didn’t foresee this or how tenting it sounds.   
Wuya moves closer to the corpse and asks for permission. She places one hand over the covered wounded and the other hand in the corpse’s head. She searches for a soul, but the body is cold and empty.  
Slowly she turns to tell Chase what she knows he is at least to some degree is aware of.  
The door opens at brutally, and lioness roars words Wuya can’t understand, but she is sure of their meaning. So she runs before the message can be delivered. She is barely able to jump out of the room and run a few feets away when she feels a gloved hand on her forearm.   
“Now! Now is when you decided to attack!” Chase says as he readies to kill the witch just like he should have killed her in the showdown instead of spicer.  
Everything is white noise, and Chase can’t feel his anger burnt him.   
“Is called revenge!” The witch hisses. Chase runs one step behind and a hoard of Jack-bots attack.   
“Is what he wanted it!” Wuya says before activating her helipad which was hidden with the fur over her shoulders and backs away.   
Wuya barely escapes Chase’s grip with a broken ulna. She pays little attention to her wound as she hurries to put distance between her and Chase.  
The warlord calls to his army, but only a few warriors come; less than twenty and they all look like they had already been beaten.  
Wuya leaves the palace followed by the robots that were not destroyed and Chase aiming for the witch’s head.  
Once outside Wuya smiles, there are not cats waiting -Jack held his word. And there was a fleet of robots, more than she thought Jack owned, waiting midair for orders from their new master.  
“Attack stupid pieces of cheap metal!” Wuya screams, and she sees projectiles flying towards Chase.   
The robots didn’t longer bother to attack the cats. The virus that their former master introduced has taken care of most of them, letting them concentrated on Chase.  
The weapons had a much higher quality than Jack’s usuals attacks, still, they shouldn’t be able to hurt Chase. The damage they cause was nearly insignificant, but there was enough ammunition to worry the dragon.  
Chase noticed the lack of energy from his warriors. He started feeling how most of his warriors were ‘pulling’ power from their master to stay alive. Chase keeps his immortal warriors alive for eternity by tying their life to his, so technically they shared a small portion of Chase life. It had never affected the warlord, even when he needs to use his energy to heal wounded warriors but he had never had to heal all of them at the same time.  
“Tired?” The witch asks from a safe distance floating behind her fleet. A robot takes care of her wound as she orders her new minions to attack Chase.  
“When I killed you, I’ll make sure you stay dead!” Chase says and jumps over one of the machines; he was surprised when the rest of the robots move away to not allow him to use them as a stair to reach the witch. The man transforms into his dragon form and uses the element of the wind to reach Wuya.   
The witch flies away and keeps out of distance.  
The more Chase uses magic, the more tire he grows and regardless of how much magic he lets his warriors take but none to seem to get better.   
“Fight me you broken shit!” Chase says, and he can imagine Jack saying does words, he spent a lot of time with Jack.   
“You should be dead! You should have died! Come and face me!”  
The warlord feels breathless and tired, every memory of Spicer weights him. Now he can feel a disease contaminating his power.   
“No, thank you!” Wuya says from afar.   
And then Chase noticed. It wasn’t Wuya’s fighting style; it was Jack’s.  
He remembers the witch saying that she was avenging Spicer, and Chase assumed that the plan -the robots, the bio-attacks, and the air fleet were all Spicer’s plan. But the witch actively changing her fighting style.   
Only Jack truly knew how much that would confused Chase, who has study everyone’s fighting styles and strategies.   
“Do what you want,” Chase says and jumps towards the ground. At the right moment, since he feels himself grow dizzy.   
“You are not fun~,” The witch says, but she starts to panic when she sees Chase walk away.  
The warlord knows how to destroy a plan aim for specific responses, and that is by becoming unresponsive -apathetic.   
Wuya doesn’t stand a chance against his hand to hand. The fleet won’t do well inside Chase’s palace since they would lose the advance of being out of reach, and the cats won’t get weaker trying to fight if Chase orders them to rest.   
The whole plan was entirely center on Chase’s making specific choices that would weaken him, and if he doesn't make those choices, then the plan is utterly useless.   
“Wow, the great Chase Young running from a fight!” Wuya calls but Chase ignores her.  
“What would Jack had said if he could see you behaving like a coward!” Wuya screams, but Chase ignores her.  
He will kill her.  
‘Jack would have known that this is resistance, not defeat.’ Chase thinks for a moment. Jack knew him well, to had made a plan so well put that Chase almost fell for it.   
The man wishes he could tell Jack that he was impressed. And then taunt him with all the details Jack missed. Chase wishes he could go to his throne room and find Jack sitting on the steps like a loyal dog. Or go to bed and wait there until noon for Jack to return with news and diagrams of his latest invention.   
It was odd; to cherish and regret every second spent with a bright mortal.   
Anger rose within him. It felt like regret not to have enjoyed every second he has. To have wasted so much time. To have waited so long because of Jack childish behavior. Chase swallow his anger and pretend that he will feel better when he kills the witch.   
Chase knows that Wuya will change the plan. She’ll choose a direct attack, and fail.   
Jack would laugh at her.  
She’ll plan something with big explosions and large minions that are too easy to defeat.  
The warlord walks inside his palace to find robots moving around. Each of them had a large cross on their chest; doc-bots. Chase knows they don’t have fighting capabilities and ignores them.   
The man moves to his closer warrior and touches her side. She irradiates warm through her thick fur, her eyes are closed, and she doesn’t seem aware that her master is next to her. The fever seems to be present in most of the cats.   
“Are you suppose to fix this?” Chase asks one of the doc-bots, but the metal creature only runs away.   
“Mmm,” Chase stands and tries to understand Jack’s plan and the presence of doc-bots. Jack knew Chase would win, and he had prepared the robots to help the cats after the fight was over. It seems like a possible option -Jack liked the cats and most likely would feel guilty of putting them through so much pain.   
Or maybe Jack thought he would be alive but hurt in this scenery, and the doc-bots are here to find their master and save him.  
It is too late if they came to save their master -he had been dead for almost a whole day.   
Chase waits until he hears Wuya entering the palace.  
“Melisa,” Chase calls a puna, the second warrior to recover but the one seems to be doing the best. She chances forms to human and tries to ignore the blunt pain across her body. She silently takes the role of guard.   
Chase leaves his warriors behind. 

He is still weak, but the witch doesn’t bother him, her only chance against him was the plan that Jack had made and the fact that it took Chase by surprise. Now she had lost both of her advances. If she was smart enough, she might leave and think of a real strategy.   
Killing her shouldn’t be hard, but for some reason, Chase is not walking towards her. He knows where she is, but he is not going to meet her.  
Chase stops in front of his guest room, the one where the corpse is.   
He hears movement and hurries to open the door, only to find more robots cleaning the room and bagging the body.  
“What do you think you are doing?” Chase asks, but he attacks before the machines could answer. He destroys but one robot in the room, and the machine trembles in fear. Chase stops and stares at the metal creature and wonders why did Spicer install fear on a machine.   
The robot moves forward, and stands in front of its former master.  
“I guess you’ll miss him too,” Chase says before destroying the last robot.   
The man walks over the debris, and he can almost hear Spicer whine over his dear robots. He walks until he stands over Spicer, his face seems to had magically gained some life, but the smell of death reminds Chase of the crude reality. There are machines or apparatus covering the corpse, and the bag had a temperature low enough to freeze the corpse. There is another bag and Chase can sense the organic material, but he doesn’t even want to think what those robots were planning to do with it. Chase guesses that the robots were trying to preserve the body better. He looks over the young man as long as he can before deciding that Spicer is gone. Chase finishes zipping the black thick bag and tries to think of something to say, but all he can think is that how useless would be to say something now.   
He still wants to say goodbye, before deciding if he should or not, an explosion steals his attention.   
“Wuya,” Chase says suddenly feeling too emotionally exhausted to continue their battle, but he leaves the room and finds the witch in his throne room or what is left of his throne room.  
Anger takes over his body once again when Chase sees the throne destroyed. That’s his favorite place to talk to his former fanboy; Chase sitting on his throne and Jack sitting on the steps like a loyal dog.  
Jack sitting on the steps like a loyal dog.   
Wuya orders the metal fighters to attack, and Chase bends the iron limbs like they were made of paper. The witch hurries to use her sonar gun which is proved to be effective against the warlord, but the attack only reminds Chase that Jack won’t create anything anymore. He ignores the pain that the sonar brings him and aims for the witch neck.  
He walks down the steps carrying Wuya by her neck.  
Jack laughing on the steps under the throne.   
He doesn’t break it, he watches the witch try to escape his grip, like the stupid rat that started everything, and Wuya, like that rat, is still alive.  
“Why couldn’t you die instead?” Chase asks before burying his fist in Wuya’s stomach. The Heylin witch lets go of her gun if she said something Chase was unable to hear her -his ears bleeding from the sonar direct attack. He yanks his hand out of Wuya, pieces of her stuck in his hand, and she is dead before Chase can clean his dirtied glove.   
Chase looks at his hand, twenty-four hours ago his hand was covered by spicer’s blood.  
Jack like a loving, loyal dog.   
“Why couldn’t you die instead?” Chase asks the spirit of the woman, he knows she is there but most likely doesn’t want to be seen.   
The man walks away from the corpse, and he can’t help to hate the way he killed Wuya, the same way he killed spicer. Because Jack was different, he meant something different -he means something different.  
Chase can’t help to chuckle at his thoughts. He knows now what he wanted to say to Jack.  
Now that is completely useless to say anything at all. Now he knows what to say.  
He leaves feeling unbalanced from the sonar gun.   
The warlord walks towards the guest room wondering how many times does he plans to disturb jack’s cold body.   
He sees doc-bots working and helping the fallen warriors, other robots trying to clean the mess that they made, and two large robots taking with them a large black bag. Chase knows what is in that bag, and he considers stopping them from taking it away, but why? For what? The Jack-bots only want to give their master a proper burial, and Chase has done enough…   
He opens the room and lets the smell of death and cleaning supplies be enough punishment. Chase closes his eyes and tries to accept what happened when he feels a sharp object against his neck.   
A knife without a doubt, but he is too tired to fight at the moment, so he lets the knife rest against his neck. The metal nicks his skin, but it doesn’t see to be able to cut any deeper than that. He looks at the blade, and then at the hand that holds it. The fingers are white as milk, and the hand small and rough. Chase looks at Spicer wearing a suit giving him a wry smile.  
The young man trembles in place, and Chase isn’t sure if it's because he is holding a knife against his neck or because Jack’s temperature is far lower than it should be.  
“...Jack?” Chase asks finally wondering if what he sees is real.   
“I tried,” Jack says as he withdraws the knife. His hands tremble so much he drops the knife. “How? How did -shit is cold!” Jack says and moves towards the bed where his corpse was. He takes the new bedcover that was only slightly stained with blood and puts it around him. “How did I do?” He asks.  
Chase opens and closes his mouth trying to find the right question that would explain everything, but then he understands.  
‘I need you to kill me.’   
Jack is too much of a coward to fight hand to hand. He needed to get out of the game -so he faked his death.   
Chase can’t believe that wasn’t his first thought when the imposter dies, but then again -it felt terribly realistic…   
Jack made sure Chase would believe it, Jack made sure Chase would kill ‘him.' And confused Chase with a unique strategy. He used the knowledge that Chase has of his opponents against the warlord -as he would never expect an air attack from Wuya.   
‘I guess I would use the sky.’   
Jack literally told him his attack plan.  
Jack faked his own death.   
Chase captures Jack’s face with his hands and looks at the face of his fanboy trying to confirm that this was his Jack.  
A second hand comes to squeeze Jack’s cheeks.   
Jack, his loving loyal fanboy, somehow infected all of Chase’s warriors with a virus to weaken Chase physically, used his own death as emotional welfare (because at this point is the only way Chase can refer to it), but he knew Chase would survive all that, win over everything.   
So Jack waited for Chase, in the same room where his impostor dead body was, to deliver the final attack.  
Every piece of the plan was a giant distraction, so Chase would enter this room tired with his guard down. So, Jack could try the oldest lamest assassination attend -the ol’ knife to the throat.   
“Are you impressed?” Jack can barely ask over the grip Chase has on his face.   
Chase looks at the albino's eyes; the red irises shine with devotion and fear of rejection, Jack’s eyes give away his every emotion and yet he tricked Chase Young.  
“Very,” Chase says and observes the love in those eyes grow, and for a moment it was too much. Chase remembers that he was trying to accept that he might never see those eyes again.  
“Did you see it coming?” Jack asks not trying to break free from Chase’s bloody hands.  
Instead of answering Chase squeezes Jack’s cheeks until the young man starts to worry for his bones.  
Jack faked his own death.   
“If you ever do that again. You better stay dead.” Chase says low, but he can feel his word resonate through the albino. He can see fear and desperation grow in Jack’s face.  
“Understood! Understood! Never, ever, again! Understood!” Jack cries -his big tears damping Chase’s gloves, and Chase lets go of his face. “So rough!” Jack says, and he caresses his cheek and cleans the blood, he wanted to complain, but he felt all words and rational thoughts leave his body when Chase hugs him.  
Jack is alive.  
It was an odd hug. Jack’s body was cold and numb. While Chase’s felt burning up in comparison. Chase usual steady heartbeat was racing up to an alarming pace. They held each other as close as it was humanly possible and longer than either of them would dare to disclose.   
Slowly Chase steps back and Jack whines as he follows Chase. They walk out of the room.  
Jack turns to look at the cats laying on the floor..  
“Yo, I’m alive. I-” Jack starts to explain, but Chase interrupts him.  
“It was part of his master plan to kill me, to pretend to be dead,” Chase says, and Jack can hear bitterness on his tone, but before Jack could press on it, he sees all the warriors turn to face another direction. Which it was a challenging task since that virus Jack used attacks proteins that take care of muscles so they should be too sore to move, regardless all of them turn to give their back towards Jack.  
“Oh, come on! It was only one day.” Jack says and hurries to follow Chase.   
“A lot can happen in one day, Spicer,” Chase says, and he notices a doc-bot following them. “Are you hurt?” Chase asks, not ready to even imagine going through that emotional void ever again. Chase looks a Jack, but the young man looks so alive. He was definitely weak, and now that they were not standing in a room covered with the smell of death and bleach, Chase could smell an outrageous amount of adrenaline pouring from Jack.   
“...Not really. But since I was out for so long, which was less than a month -much less than what I expected to be out, the doc-bot just needs to check my vitals and all that jazz.” Jack says with ease. “That one if for you.” Jack points to the other doc-bot that were following them.  
“...You are aware that I’m immortal and that I heal?” Chase says looking at the robot.  
“So, that doesn’t mean I want you in pain. No even for a minute!” Jack says dramatically, and he steps back when Chase glares at him.   
Chase considers accusing Jack of lying since he made him believe he killed Jack. That was far more painful than Chase would like to admit.   
“I know you had a headache-”  
“I had a headache every time I see your face!” Chase interrupts, anger resurfacing to undermine any other emotion.  
“And I made a pill with dragon-like proteins. It should work I-”  
“I did notice you had made weapons aim to weaken me. ‘But not even a minute of pain.’” Chase tries to keep his poker face, but he can taste his anger.   
It tastes a lot like desperation.   
Like he was ready to give anything to Jack so that he would shut up for two minutes and stay alive forever.  
“I tested it already, remember? You said it tasted like seaweed.” Jack says, and Chase remembers when Jack was trying to replicate the active ingredient on the Lao Mang Lone soup.   
The genius gets a pill from the robot following Chase and offers it to the man. Chase takes it and chews it; he remembers Jack not being very happy when Chase informed him that he doesn’t take pills -he doesn’t swallow anything he can’t taste and therefore forcing Jack to restart the experiment.   
“It still tastes like seaweed powder,” Chase says and feels his anger dying out. He was still angry enough to kill Wuya again -though she was just a tool of Jack’s plan, he can’t help to feel relief.  
“Taste or function! You know bio is not my strength.” Jack says and waits for Chase to move.  
“Your turn,” Chase says, and Jack whines because his treatment was far more than to take a pill.  
Chase waits as Jack is checking by various doc-bots. They take his blood, his vital, flashlights, ask questions…   
“Did they know?” Chase asks, and Jack turns confused.   
The millennium-old man can feel himself growing older in comparison to the youth who grows stupider. “What could we be talking about?” Chase asks, and Jack makes a little ‘o’ shape with his lips.  
“No. No really. I had a small group that stayed with me, you know taking care of me, but besides that, they didn’t know. I figure that if my own robots couldn’t tell the difference, then nobody could.” Jack says and Chase nods, understanding even though he doesn’t want to.   
“‘Stay with you’? Where were you?” Chase asks thinking how didn’t he found him, but then again he wasn’t looking for Jack.  
“On a secret safe-house. The one by Panjin. Oh, I finish the construction of my Panjin base, you should visit is really pretty.” Jack says, and Chase glares a little, so Jack returns his attention to the robots.  
“How were you able to stay still for so long?” Chase asks, he hopes Jack won’t say that he was having a grand time on the beautiful beach.  
“I put myself in a coma,” Jack says, and Chase can’t hide his surprise.  
“...You know what that could have done to your brain?” Chase says slowly like he was talking to a foolish child.  
“A very low possibility. And I had very good doc-bots with me. I just couldn’t risk Wuya sensing my life presence -or whatever, and ruining everything!” Jack tries to defend himself.  
“You could have left China,” Chase says.  
“Then I wouldn’t have made it in time to sneak inside the palace. And even if I didn’t ...win, it was still pretty impressive.” Jack cries a little more, frustrated that Chase doesn’t appreciate all his hard work.   
The doc-bots prescribe some vitamins, antibodies, rest and regular check-ups.  
Also rest, and to ‘please, stop moving.’ But Jack said he felt good.  
They also recommend for Jack to eat something light.  
“Should I call my chefs or you had something premade?” Chase asks with a sigh.  
“Can my robots cook instead? I think your warriors might be too hurt and butt-hurt (-burt?) to cook me something.” Jack says and Chase nods.  
They walk in silence for a while until Jack speaks again.  
“I’m sorry okay. I know it was shitty move to pretend to be dead.”  
“Don’t you say.” Chase can’t help to hate how much of Spicer’s speech patterns has he adopted.   
“I didn't think you would care...for reals,” Jack says.  
“Isn’t that a lazy last minute work of a cheap lie,” Chase says, and he sees Jack flinch. “Your whole plan revolved around me feeling guilty of -” Chase can’t finish, not when Jack won’t understand.  
Not when he can still remember his gloves cover with dried blood, and those rubies eyes looking at him for the very last time.  
“No...You were supposed to feel guilty over breaking your promise.” Jack clarifies even though he knows it won’t make things better.  
Chase stays quiet for a moment, of course, he felt bad about breaking his promise, but the thought that he won’t see Spicer again was what he couldn’t take.  
“Shit!” Jack says, and Chase thinks that Jack finally understands, but no. Jack runs towards a tiger on the floor; Noah.  
“Kitty, I told my bots not to be too rough with you guys!” Jack says, but Noah ignores him and pretends to be death (but it was easy to tell he was alive.) “Did Wuya beat him up?” Jack asks.  
“...That doesn’t matter.” Chase decides.  
It was still indirectly Spicer’s fault.   
“Fuck.” Jack curses again as he sees the walls of the hall. “Wuya went way off script if she attacked here!” Jack looks at the end of the hall trying to see where the destruction ends, but it seems to come from one of the training rooms.  
“How did you know Wuya would fight for you?” Chase asks him mostly to distract Jack from asking questions about the damage not cause by Wuya.  
“I figure she owned me, you know. For all those times I did her bidding when she was a spirit. I knew that she still kinda bound to honor my last request.” Jack says. “And I asked nicely.” He finishes.  
“You know she is dead.” Chase states.  
“I know she’ll be pissed!” Jack says looking at his black shiny shoes.  
“Why are you wearing a suit?” Chase asks as he moves over Noah to heal the wounds he caused.  
“I think this is what people wear at funerals. Isn’t?” Jack asks as he brings part of the bed covers over his head.  
“...you thought I would give you a western burial?” Chase asks almost curious.  
“I thought ...yeah?” And Jack shrugs his shoulders. Chase lets it pass like the young man didn’t think of every detail, but the way his plan had perfectly unfold was almost scary. But at the same time, Jack prepares to help his ‘opponent’ recover from his attack.   
“I think I saw you before you attack me,” Chase says as he remembers the corpse that had miraculously regain some life. And the robots cleaning the room. Now he can’t help but feel completely fooled by Spicer -the king of all fools.  
Chase looks at the young man, he looks so ...natural, like he was never wound or killed. Which he wasn’t, but the image of the imposter still burns within Chase’s mind.  
“The food is ready. Are you hungry?” Jack asks.  
“Do you think I could have an appetite right now?” Chase asks, and Jack nods.  
“You fought a lot…” Jack says, and Chase just walks towards the dining room because if he has to talk to Jack for one more minute, he would hurt his fanboy.  
Chase hearing is completely healed, and he uses it to locate Jack’s heartbeat.   
Strong, steady, and there.  
The large table was served with too much food, even for Chase’s standards. Like this was a celebration.   
The warlord sits on his chair, the head of the table, and he looks at Jack who seems unsure where to sit. He had been quiet on the way to the dining room like he had finally understood that Chase wasn’t happy with his grand master plan.  
“Your insecurity annoys me,” Chase says and the chair that Spicer uses typically, left to Chase’s, moves as an offer.   
Jack happily takes the sit, his bright smile comes back to his face as if Chase had forgiven him for all the heartache.  
Jack picks his spoon and slowly he fishes for carrots on his rice soup.   
It was oddly surreal.   
“I thought you were dead,” Chase says and Jack chews his food.  
“That kinda was the point.”   
Silent follows that statement and Jack becomes too self-conscious to keep eating.   
“I’m sorry.” That you are mad and hurt.  
Jack forces himself to say.   
The warlord looks at the young man bitterly play with his food.   
“Your plan worked well.” Chase forces himself to admit.   
The genius smiles at the very emotionally tired man.   
“I didn’t want to play this stupid game. You know that!” Jack blurs out “But I play to win.”   
“Tell me how you did it.”  
“Um. Well?” Jack looks around him like the answer was written somewhere. “You know. I pretend to be dead, got Wuya to play alone, and then hide on the room. I mean, once broken down there isn’t much to explain.” Jack takes another spoonful of soup and finds that there are boil eggs on it.   
“Mm.” Chase looks at Jack and pulls the greasy hair out of the way. The red dye was a cherry-orange instead of it usual cherry red, and an inch or two longer too. “Tell me the details.”  
Jack blinks a few times as he tries to remember what he did. His arm moves automatically and he eats another spoonful. He couldn’t think of anything to say.   
“I don’t know where to start.” Jack felt a headache coming and he tries to massage it away.  
“From the beginning.” Chase's voice was soft, but his tone was cold. He carefully dissects Jack’s plan. He waits to hear the reasoning of each action but Chase already knew the reason. Jack might be young but his values had been settled. The core values that define his essence as a person included cheating, lying, and back-staving. He learned them from Wuya when he was still a child.  
Jack moves to take a glass of water and drinks it all in one swing.   
“I mean, I’m sure you already know.” Jack sits back down and massages his legs. “but I’ll happily explain my master plan.”   
“Do you want to lay down first?”  
“Is that an option? Yes please!” Jack struggles to get on his feet and Chase watches him calmly.   
Once Jack is standing up, Chase teletransport both of them to a room.   
The room was beautiful, adorned with deep greens and golds.  
“Pretty,” Jack says as he looks at the old paintings and intricate wallpaper.  
Jack sits on the edge of the bed and tries to take his shoes off with his feet, but he appears too weak to even do that. He whispers a ‘whatever’ and tries to get comfortable in the bed.   
Jack isn’t surprised when Chase sits too close to him or when a hand caresses his face and neck. The young man felt so tired he didn’t even notice his eyes slowly closing.  
“I’m sorry I tried to stab you,” mumbles.  
“I barely notice,” Chase answers as he remembers the white finger, and seeing Jack alive.   
“I figured.” Jack stops and Chase lightly digs his thumb underneath Jack’s jaw. “I thought you would want me to deliver the ‘final blow,’ even though it was weak and anti-climatic.” Jack moves around uncomfortable with the topic but too comfortable under Chase’s touch.  
“No. The real attack hid under the false calm of victory. It was.” Chase turns to look at Jack. The young man gives him a small smile like he can’t help to smile when Chase looks his way. “It was surprising. Well done.” Chase says, and he can remember Jack trembling, cold, and scared.  
Jack lets the rare praise slowly soak in his tired mind.  
“I didn’t think I would see your face again.” Chase continues.  
“You wish.” Jack yawns as he stretches his back against the soft mattress.  
“I didn’t know how your eyes looked when you can’t feel nothing anymore, now I do,” Chase says trying to shake out the memory of the impostor’s ruby eyes slowly losing their life.  
“...okay.” Jack half murmurs. Chase glares at him, but it doesn’t stop Jack from falling asleep.   
The older man sits next to Jack and listens to the young heart.  
“You are a truly terrible person. Incredibly insensitive for a guy who cries so often.” Chase says and moves Jack to a better position.   
Jack only sinks deeper into his sleep.   
“You are so stupid; it amazes me.”   
Chase should leave but he stays. He lays on the other side of the bed trying to understand every step behind Jack’s plan. Chase imagines every thought driving each action until he falls asleep.


	6. Cheating is Relative

Around nine Jack woke up to the soft clicks of porcelain plates against a glass table. The mortal stares at the food placed next to him. It was simple. He is used to large over the top meals at Chase’s home. But Today’s breakfast was bowls of fresh and dried fruits, plates full with cereal and granola, a tall glass jar with honey, a platter with bread and a huge hot metal teapot with a matching set of  cups. 

Chase drank patiently from his cup while reading a thick blue binder. 

“Good morning.” Jack says without his usual enthusiasm. 

“I’m surprised you are awake.” Chase says as he turns a page.

“I guess I already slept enough.” Jack hums and looks at the file titled ‘25.’ “Is the writing plan helping? I didn’t have time to edit it. So, it might be hard to read.”

“It is.” Chase turns the page back and re-reads the last paragraph. 

“Hey!” Jack tries to sit up to look at the page but his back won’t cooperate. “I was under lots of pressure while writing that. And, I didn’t even had to. So, sorry if the grammar is off or if I inverted a few sentences” Jack twists and turns under the covers until he can use his arms to push himself up. He felt his arms tremble under the effort but he pushes through it. 

“That’s not the problem.” Chase says without looking from the same paragraph.

“Oh?” Jack gives up and uses Chase’s arm to pull himself up to an sitting position. A little surprise that Chase let him. “You know, I feel like I’m made of jelly and my head hurts in a funny way. But what can I do for you?” Jack rests his body over Chase’s. He tries to ignore their proximity or the way his heartbeat races. He fakes a casual cough and steadies himself. Jack knows he isn’t allow to be this close to Chase. He knows this is a temporary privilege until he regains some strength, but it was still oddly nice. It was nice to have Chase Young close enough to smell his shampoo, patient enough to wait for him without rushing him, and invested enough to stay throughout the night.

“Read this.” Chase angles the file so Jack could read the paragraph without moving. 

Jack took a few seconds and read the page, then he re-read it again. He made a little hum sound while he thought what to say. Before answering Jack re-read the page a third and fourth time.

“Okay. What?” 

Chase wore his usual poker face and calmly asks. 

“What those it mean?” 

Jack blinks a few times and looks at the paper and automatically reads outloud the paragraph.  

“Day 29-AH: Clone ‘jack spicer’ will land at the north garden during monthly long-range attacks practice. Sit under favorite spot under the fig tree. Alpha Jack-bots group will activate an ‘unknown’ signal after approximately 67 minutes at the other side of the garden. Clone will follow the signal on foot until reach assigned spot near the hidden target practice. Once clone reaches signal origin, he will freeze and wait until weapon makes contact. If successful, then move to step ‘Day 29-AHA1.’ If not successful, then move to step ‘Day 29-AHA2.’” Jack stops reading and adds. “I made 25 different possible options for that clone to die. The timing seems off but I guess that programing doesn’t work on organic matter.”

Chase turns the page but he isn’t reading anymore. 

“The clone had multiple predetermined environmental escenarios in which under the right conditions he would freeze. The main trigger is the ‘unknown’ signal.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty much it.” Jack answers the statement while trying to reach for some bread.  

“All the planned ways your clone was suppose to die are written here.” Chase asks, but Jack knows he doesn’t really needs an answer. He is quizzing Jack.

“Yes.”

“This was the only major difference between you and the clone. Besides that essential distinction, you and the clone would act identically.” 

“Yeah, I mean-”

“Any choice your clone made while replacing you is, more likely than not, a choice you would have made.”

“Yes. That’s what the file says and-”

“So, the clone, your perfect copy, decided to sneak into a fight between Hannibal, Wuya, the monks and me. This was not programed or planned. It was an independent decision your clone took.”

Jack stops trying to explain. He was informed how his cloned die, but there was so much happening Jack didn’t thought about it. 

“How did he die again?” Jack suddenly felt nervous. The odd kind of nervous that cannot be explain with words. 

“He sneak into a fight between Hannibal, Wuya, the monks and me.” Chase turns a few pages and glare at all the diagrams and timelines; they were all useless. “An scenario I just couldn’t find in your written plan.” 

Jack’s body reacted before his brain. He felt sick and heavy and nervous. Jack felt nauseous when he hears ‘Hannibal.’

“I would never try to include Hannibal into a plan like that.” Maybe younger Jack Spicer might. But today, Jack Spicer knew he should be very afraid of that old monster.

“I thought so.” Chase agrees but Jack isn’t listening. 

Jack’s felt his body too heavy to move and his head spin into a vertigo inducing spiral. He remembers in a flash every word he wrote. Every plan, every variant and every mistake.

“They hasn’t been any Wu’s activated for months before I planned -much less an important one that gets the Hannibal and Chase Young together.” 

Not too long ago, it was normal to see the great evils walk around the young monks. It was in many ways an insult to the young monks, who were not taken as a serious threat or were able to distinguish the importance of each opponent. Now, the monks know better. They quickly disarm Jack and ask him almost politely to leave, and prepare to take down any greater villain with a ridiculously amount of force. 

“It is safe to assume that the death of your clone was accidental.” Chase knew the answer.

Jack sat up straight and took the file from Chase. He flits through pages trying to find the option that the clone followed. He knows it isn’t there. 

The report states that ‘dying’ phase of the plan was ‘skipped.’   

“No. I mean no. Not really. It was program to died so maybe-” The first instinct is to denied death. But Jack is a man of science, and he sees the evidence spelled out in his own file. “Well, that is what the report says. So, yes. I think that’s what happen.” Jack says while trying not to think that his clone and he were technically identical, and the actions that got the clone killed were the same that he would have chosen.

Jack took a deep breath and let the anxiety he felt settled in his chest. 

Chase stares blankly at Jack like he was expecting to see something else.

“You cheated.” Chase states and Jack turns already looking indignant it. 

“No. Nope. There were no rules, so it was impossible for me to cheat! So-” Jack starts arguing, but Chase silences him with a look.

“You cheated death,” Chase says and looks at his fanboy. And Chase knows that Jack is stupid enough to have entered a battle that he can’t win and get himself killed. 

“You said it yourself, the clone was a perfect copy of you -not your robots, allies or enemies, and not even I were able to tell the difference.” The imposter had the exact humor, cried by the same tiny everyday problems, and he was in love with Chase Young -just like Jack Spicer. “If that had been you, you would have made the same choices; and, you would be dead. Without meaning to, you remove yourself from a situation that would have gotten you kill. Well, in some way it did.” Chase looks at Jack while fear and understanding slowly creep into his mind, and his eyes widen with panic. “If you haven’t made such convoluted plan that required you to make an imposter, then you would have been in that showdown, tried to fight Wuya. I would have driven my hand through your stomach and watch you die,” Chase explains, and Jack puts down the file. 

“You cheated death, Jack.” Chase says, but he feels like Jack is not listening. 

The man sighs and wonders if he should try to comfort Jack, but how? He can’t relate to the fear of death...but he understands the fear of not having Jack alive. 

But that is a different matter.

“You were aware of the danger when you started to fight the Xiaolin, and you understood the dangers when you joined the Heylin,” Chase says, and Jack slowly turns to him.

Sometimes Jack surprises Chase in small ways: not with his inventions, knowledge nor even his rare beauty, but the way he can be so stupid.

“I forgot I was going to die! Okay. I- I don’t think about that stuff… ” Jack explains. His voice was small and aggressive.

“You are a mortal!” Chase says even though now that Jack had said it, he knows that he made the same mistake. 

Jack didn’t need to think about his own dismiss because once it happens, he won’t had any control over it. 

When Jack dies, time won’t stop to allow the fanboy to reconsider his life choices. No, Jack most likely than not will die like his impostor; too soon and too fast to let anyone try to save him. The next hours will come, and Jack will no longer be part of the realm of the living.

Chase caresses the pale skin and sees little tears stuck on the white eyelashes.

The young man glares at the file. A quick guide with multiple ways he could have died. 25 possible ways he could die cramped in a period of two months.

“I know, I know. I keep saying that I was going to die, but I forgot what that meant. Like I am going to stop existing, and that is fucking terrifying Chase.” Jack hurries to say, and by the end of that sentence, he can barely understand what he is saying. 

Chase lets Jack come closer and support his weight on him. The old warrior had never imagined what would it be if Jack stops to exists. He told himself that his fanboy will die, but he never stop to consider what would that mean. 

And it means that he would never see Jack again. It seems obvious, yet it’s impossible to accept.

“I know,” Chase says, and he hates how much he means that.

The young man breathes deeply before separating himself from Chase. A thing he never thought he would willingly do, but he had already shared with Chase in that small moment more than he had shared with his therapist over the last couple of years.

Chase wipes the tears from Jack’s face and decides that he won’t live through Jack’s death. 

“It’s weird.” Jack lets the anxiety that he felt earlier run through him and out of him. “I have been so close to death so many times. I guess everything changes when you stop to think about it.”

“You are surrounded by immortal beings. It is natural that your perception of death might be a bit shallow.” 

“I don’t like it.” Jack states and he returns to lay in bed. He snuggles against his covers trying to make a warm spot.    

****

Jack thought he wouldn’t be able to sleep, but fell asleep quickly and deeply. 

 

****

When he wake up he was stripped to his underwear and laying against the cold white tile of an unknown room. A panther told him he had a fever. Not high enough to concerned the robots, but not low enough to allowed him to stay under the heavy bed covers. They told him that Chase has been gone for almost an hour. 

Jack closes his eyes and tries to go back to sleep, but he felt the temperature drop. A chill ran through his spine and pure survival instinct forced him to stand up. 

Jack turns around looking for someone. He knows his only defense is running, but he is too weak to run. It hurts to just stand.

“Chase?” He whispers hopeful. But he knew better. The room was impossibly quiet and Jack knew even if he screams no one would hear him.  

“Jack.” The voice was new. It was the same familiar voice Jack grew up listening, but it was so hateful he didn’t recognize her. 

“Jack.” It came from nowhere. “You are alive.” 

“Wuya?” Jack lets out a sigh and nervously smiles at the air. 

“Jack.” The ghost appears in front of Jack’s face, he steps back and loses his balance. “You lie to me.” 

Jack sits up and looks up to find the room empty.

“I know, I’m sorry.” 

Wuya appears next to a pillar. She stays there and a black substance drips from the eye sockets of her mask.

“Are you?”

Jack stands from the floor and takes in the question. 

They don’t know. 

Mentor and student awkwardly wait for a sign. 

Wuya taught Jack to lie. She founded her values into Jack’s young eager mind. She told him that all teams only have a singular member -no exceptions, that there is always another way and another fool to trick, that to burn a bridge is a tactical choice, and that all hard-earn-trust will eventually be broken. Wuya showed him time after time that no betrayal was too low if it took you closer to your goal.

She taught Jack year after year, and he learned every time. 

So, Jack saw his little scheme as a natural decision. Using Wuya made as much sense as using stairs; they were there for a reason after all. 

That didn’t mean he didn’t love her in his own way.

And Wuya, she had learned that even she had expectations of loyalty. Maybe, even caring feelings towards Jack, like an aunt or an overly investment friend.

“I’ll make it up to you,” Jack smiles, unaware that once trust is broken it will never be as strong.

“I thought you were dead.” Wuya says and wipes her ghostly tears from her face. 

“Yeah. I heard it was very convincing.” Jack says uncomfortable.

“Asshole.”

Jack laughs at little, as if everything was already forgiven. It wasn’t.

“Okay, but you would have done the same.”

“Death is different Jack.” 

Silence followed. Not supernatural silence like before. Jack could hear his breath and his feet against the tile. 

“I guess it is.” Jack lowers his body with the help of the pillar. He noticed he was sweating a lot. “Wuya?”

“Piece of shit?” 

“Is it scary?” Jack’s mouth was dry.

Jack didn’t have to say ‘what,’ Wuya knew.

The ghost floats closer to Jack. She almost touch him, but she didn’t.

“Yes. It’s terrifying. Every single time I die; it’s pure agony.”

“Oh?” Jack feels the cold tile against his back and stares at the tall ceiling. 

“Maybe it will be different for you.” Wuya lies. 

“It won’t.” The ceiling was so tall, it made Jack dizzy. “It’ll be terrifying. I’m already terrified.” 

“Jack, don’t fight it.” Wuya comes closer. she sees Jack trembled to her touch. “It’s hypocrite of me, but everything dies. Sooner or later. It’s how the cycle works or something. Do not get off that cycle, because you will exist in a stage of fear. Aware that death will come for you. Some creatures can’t stop being human as much as they try.”

“Thank you.” Jack says but he was looking at something in the distance. He was looking at the details in the ceiling and how it seems to move higher and higher. Or maybe, he was being pulled downwards.

“Jack? Are you awake?”

“It was an accident. I never meant for you to see it.” Jack says before closing his eyes and Wuya screams for the guards.  _ I don’t want to die. _

****

The great cats and med-bots rush in to attend Jack.

****

Jack wake up in his bedroom. The room was clean, an array of pill bottles had been organized by name over his desk, and multiple machines monitors his condition. He looks at the pink serum and the plastic tube hiding under his bed covers. Jack carefully takes out needle from his arm and bangedes himself with the large band-aid prepared by his robots. It didn’t hurt at all which made Jack worry. The pink serum normally leaves an ugly purple bruise which hurts as bad as it look; however, it didn’t hurt at all. The bruise is there, but the pain was missing. 

“How are you feeling?” Chase asked from somewhere Jack couldn’t see.

“Well, terrible. Just awful. And, like, I feel tired of sleeping.” Jack sits up, and notice that his body still felt too weak to do anything. “Also, I’m naked.” 

“The robots said you passed out from exhaustion.” Chase moves closer but Jack can’t see him yet. “And, I insisted on you being bath.”

“Mm?” Jack signals a robot to bring him a T-shirt. “What are you doing hiding in the shadows like a creep?” Jack asks, and he discovers that at least he is wearing boxers.

“I was checking how your minions kept your mansion in your absent.” 

“And?!” Jack asks excited.

“Sufficient.” Chase appears next to the bed and takes a sit at the end.

“I knew this day will come! I’m so proud.” Jack big eyes shine like they always do when he is happy. 

The medical equipment shifts into a med-bot and presents an screen to Jack. 

“Are you bedridden?”

“No. But I should be.” Jack hums and clicks over commands. “I specifically instructed to not start physical therapy until after I regain some weight. But apparently, my doctor thinks that a combination of serums, medication and light physical activity might be more beneficial to me. What he knows! Oh. There is even a comment about how I engaged in highly stressful situations with a ‘weaken state.’ The audacity!” Jack rants and frowns at the computer. 

“It sounds like a reasonable suggestion.” Chase doesn’t even try to read the chart. He read the medical report while Jack was passed out enough times to recite it. 

“Well. It not that! Is just that -well, they...they didn’t ask me.” Jack rubs the ark of his nose. A habit he picked up from Chase. “The recovery plan was done by their judgment...I don’t think you understand how terrifying that is. And annoying.” Jack tries to explains. Chase doesn’t agrees aloud, but he can guess that it must be worrisome if artificial intelligence starts to out thinking you. Jack is used to being the first one to think of everything. Recommendations are not welcome.

“Don’t underestimate my capacities, Spicer.” Chase says and he sees Jack trembled. 

“I don’t! I just thought that - I mean. I -it was an expression!” Jack tries to apologize while the a robot brings a wheelchair near the bed.

“Is that necessary?” Chase asks.

“Mm? I guess not really. Most likely I could make it on my own. But since I passed out, I should try not to push it.” Jack almost fell getting off the bed and it took him more than one try to sit on the chair. “I guess if you don’t use it you lose it.” Jack mumbles nervously. 

“You’ll recover soon.” Chase moves to replace the robot pushing the wheelchair. “You need to use start using your legs, like you had been using your arms.” 

They move out of the room and into the hall. 

“I guess. Though my arms still feel heavy.” Jack quickly exercises his fine motor skills by making each finger touch the thumb. “My fingers are doing okay.” 

They turn towards the stairs. Jack was about to explain that he designed that wheelchair to go up and down stair, when they simply appear downstairs. Magic.

“I have seen you taken care of them.”

“Why don’t you magic us the the room?” 

They pass large lavish locked rooms with priceless objects gathering dust. 

“I suppose I’m enjoying the quiet and calm for a while.”

“Enough excitement, eh?” Jack hangs his head backwards to catch a glimpse of Chase. 

The man doesn’t react, but Jack can read his silence. 

They turned, and there is an open door. The room is both overcrowded and empty. Every inch of the baby-blue/white-flowery wallpaper is cover by a bookshelf or a picture frame. Each bookshelf is full with dozens of tea sets. And each frame has a too detail scenic painting. Yet, the maybe-lighter-maybe-darker blue carpet was rather bare. 

The only other furniture was a tiny coffee table and two chairs arrange in front of the balcony. 

In the coffee table there was a teapot with a matching set of teacups. 

Jack felt panic sneak into is gut. Panic that travels from deep inside you to your skin, and it boils your nerves until you are sweating your fears. So everyone can tell you have something to hide. 

“How long has it been?” Jack shifts in his chair that know feel uncomfortable and restricting. 

“A few minutes.”

“No. I mean; how long has it been since my clone die?”  _ In front of everyone.  _ Jack hopes he sounds casual and not agitated. 

“They took it pretty bad.”

“Oh. Okay.” Jack looks down feeling guilty. “But, um, how long has it been?” 

“They were all a mess.” Chase drags every word and Jack waits patiently like a trained dog. “Wuya was a mess.” Jack supposes is fair to be taunt this way. After all, he made this mess. “But Omi. Oh, you die in his hand.” That wasn’t fair.

“Please.” Jack turns to look at Chase Young. Large crocodile tears threaten to fall. 

“It’ll be three days today at 5:53.”  

Jack falls back in his chair defeated. 

“If you plan to tell your ‘friend,’ then hurry.” Chase moves them to the room where a too enthusiastic robot receive them. 

“I forgot.” Jack whispers and another robot comes to help Jack from the chair to the padded floor. Chase never talk about Omi to Jack. Not for years now.

Jack lets the robot move his tired limbs as the guilt settles in. Wuya was so hurt by his little stunt. She saw it as a clear act of betrayal, and she was Wuya. Then, Jack could barely imagine how would Omi feel.

“telling him means telling everyone.” 

“Well, people are going to find out I’m not dead sooner or later.” Jack uses his right arm to prop himself high enough to look at Chase. He was sitting in a velvet chair. 

“You chose ‘sooner.’” Chase talks slowly. Every word loaded with opportunity. Jack’s arm gives up and he is flat on the floor again. The robot-therapist carefully flexes and extends each leg. The exercise gradually grew from uncomfortable to painful. 

“Wuya already knows.” Jack says. But he knows the witch will keep the information to herself, unless she can get something out of it. “And Omi won’t forgive me if I purposely keep this from him.” 

“Of course. But he is your enemy.” Chase casually adds. Like he doesn’t know all secrets. 

“Yeah. I know but he is sensitive!” Jack pushes the robot which tries to make Jack’s knees touch his chest. Omi was Xiaolin and Jack is Heylin. They had been enemies since the day they met. It was a simple constant relationship. If Jack saw it as an opportunity for friendship, it was only because he was so lonely. 

And Omi was so hopeful. 

When Jack left the Xiaolin temple after his little attempt at becoming a monk, Omi looked for him. Like a friend would. 

“You choose him over a great opportunity.” Chase says, pauses, and changes the topic. “What are they doing to your legs?”

“Uh?” Jack tries to wiggle away from the robot. “Torture.” 

“Oh. Then maybe they should get some restrains.” Chase smirks standing next Jack. The young man gasps surprise but he tries to act cool. 

“Nothing can restrain me.” He smiles and Chase takes Jack’s anklet. “Chase, what are you doing?” Jack considers moving away, but he knows resistance is useless.

“Torture, I guess.” Chase carefully flexes Jack’s knee and guides the leg slowly to his chest. He stops for a few seconds every time Jack squeals or unintentionally pushes back. He stops where the robot stop the first time. “Now, push me back.” 

Jack pouts but obeys. It takes a lot more effort than he expected to extend his leg. 

Then the other leg.

It wasn’t quite pain what Jack felt. It felt like all his muscles were too tight. And that his body resent any movement.

“Thank you. I guess.” Jack wipes his sweaty forehead with disgust. Though, as it exhausted as he was, he recognized the effort as caring. It made Jack smile.

“What is next?” Chase asks and Jack’s smile is replaced by a little ‘o.’ 

“What do you mean?” Jack asks 

“Arm exercises. Stretches, and minimum resistance wire.” A doc-bot answers.

“You should sit.” Chase tells Jack who looks at him with incredulous eyes.

“You chose their side!” Jack says hurt. “I thought you were being nice, but no!” Jack obeys and clumsily sits up.

“Don’t be so dramatic. Yes, I got you to do  your physical therapy.” Chase says.

Jack silently asks Chase for a more lenient treatment. 

The arm exercises were by far the easiest. It was uncomfortable but easy enough to ignore. Jack was distracted by the sound of Chase’s long hair moving near him. Jack pays attention to the soft touch that guides him. Chase Young wasn’t a soft man.

****

Stretching required the most assistance. Jack observes the calm expression in Chase’s face. He looks worried. Under the usually unreadable poker face, Chase looks worried. 

“Is there something I should know?” Jack asks and Chases moves to push Jack’s knees into a butterfly position.

“Yes. But I doubt the information would be useful to you.” 

Jack felt his muscles fight against the force exerted over his legs. 

“Would it be more useful later?” Jack groans and pushes his own knees down. The sooner the exercise is over, the sooner it would all end. 

“I suppose.” Chase releases Jack who fall backwards. “I believe I’ll be attack soon by Hannibal and others.”

“Oh.” Jack nods.

“They see your death, unaware it was a fake, as an opportunity.” 

“Oh,” Jack repeats. “Sorry.”

“Others attacking me is not your fault. Faking your death, yes, your fault.” 

Jack considers defending himself, but he remembers something Chase told him years ago. Jack was pretty drunk and Chase was unhappy about it. It along the lines of ‘ _ you are the justification to your actions _ ’ or something like that. So Jack bites his tongue and thinks. 

“I guess you could use this opportunity to play your game for real. Who will and how will they try to kill the Heylin prince.” 

Chase makes a little humming sound.

“It’s not a game Jack.” Chase rolls the resistance band between his fingers. The material didn’t give off the ugly plastic smell most do. “And you could see who claims your inventions first. Even, find who tries to benefit from your demise.” 

“Who wouldn’t? No that is much to get from me. I don’t even think anyone wants my spot in the Heylin ranks.” Jack consider what valuables he has. His. His merits, information, inventions, weapons. His reputation. Not his parents or anyone else. Something to be proud. 

He is Jack Spicer boy genius. Except he isn’t a boy anymore, but he continues to perform the same tasks. 

He changed. Jack knows his has, but everything around him felt the same. For a moment Jack wonders if that’s how life works. If everything takes too long to change and he will be dead before accomplishing anything significant. 

“You see.” Chase curiously pulls on the band. “You have been steadily supplying weapons and vehicles to the black market. Many will try to fill your role.” 

“True.” Jack smiles slightly to the well earned praise. He is Jack Spicer, Mechanical genius. And he has clients.

“Alike, you have plenty of unfinished projects that others will try to steal and claim.”

Jack doesn’t answer to that. He has never consider let anyone touch his project. But if he will die, then maybe someone else can keep his work alive.

“You had meet every Heylin member worth remembering. You had a sensible position that if abruptly ended, it will result in chaos. And, you had a very odd but stable relationship with the Xiaolin Monks, Wuya the Heylin witch, and me; Chase Young the Heylin Dragon.” The band between Chase’s hands snaps and Jack remembers who he was talking to.

“Thank you.” Jack says sincerely. “I love being praised.” Jack moves closer the Chase. “But can I ask you, what do you want?” 

There was a small prideful smile. Chase picks up another band and moves to give Jack each end without letting go of his hands. 

“Oh, I was just thinking.” Chase says behind a chuckle. Both knew that a younger version of Jack Spicer would had eaten the bait and ask no questions, maybe even a few months ago. But, everything is more intense now. Jack Spicer felt like his guard was up for the first time. 

“I like it when you think of me.” Jack happily admits but there was fear that wouldn’t leave him yet. He still worries about his inevitable dead. A possibility that only until recently seems real. “Did you got to any conclusions?” 

Chase chuckles and moves closer, but there is no more space to move. Jack tilts back, a pair of hands catch him and lower him to the floor. The world got a bit darker as Chase’s black hair falls around them blocking the light. It separates them from the rest of the room making their conversation much more private. Jack blushes under the intense stare of the golden eyes that observe him. He nervously stretches his legs into a more comfortable position, wiggles from side to side to find a comfortable place in his small selection, he fixes his hair that is a mess, tries to calm the giggles that keep raising from his gut, and without thinking he places a hand over Chase’s right shoulder unconsciously asserting a little of control. Chase patiently observes Jack until he is ready to speak.

“Anything worth sharing?” Jack voice was too high and he felt like the whole world’s temperature must have increase at least 10C, everything felt so hot. 

“As matter of fact, yes.” Chase says visibly taken pleasure in their new proximity. “I want to see how can my enemies use your absence against me?” 

“Oh, okay.” Jack says without giving a second thought. In his defense, he wasn’t thinking. 

Chase smiles at Jack wide enough to flash his fangs. 

It takes a while for Jack to understand.

“Wait. Are you asking me to stay fake-dead?” 

The calculative golden eyes shine with glee. 

“You had created an strange and unique opportunity. One that gives me the advantage over Hannibal’s inevitable attack. He believes I am mourning!” Chase takes Jack’s hand, looks at the pale fingers still holding the band and quietly ties a new knot. 

“Okay. Sure. Let’s pretend I could say ‘no’ for a moment.” Jack takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. He tries to force himself to focus. “Okay. See, what that means for me? I literally put myself in a coma to stay out of site. I mean, I can say ‘yes’ now but you know that without close supervision I will break my word. And, what happens when  your enemies figure out I faked my dead? What if I have fucking Hannibal hunting me down?”

“You hide. Because you knew I would have look for you. You will keep your word because you respect your word and  me .” Jack avoids eye contact. “My enemies are mine. If they try to target you, then I’ll see to it personally.” Chase leans to the left and settles next to Jack. When Chase moves light spills back in and it saturates Jack’s senses. “There is a reason for you.”

“Oh?” 

“I underestimated you. I continue to treat you as a child. When you have grown. I want to use this opportunity to assess your position. Which gives you the chance to prove your value to me. If you choose to, of course.” 

Jack blinks a few times and looks at the man laying next to him. Chase Young didn’t need sweet talking to accept anything. And no one knows that better than Chase Young himself. So, the little flirting was a decision and a possible distraction. Either way, Jack already knew his answer.

“Okay.” Jack says and ignores his hesitation. “I want a chance to become your ally. A real one!”

Chase chuckles.

“That’s what I’m offering.” 

Chase sat up and Jack struggle to follow. His hands were tied with the resistance band.

“What happens if I die.” Jack bursts from the floor. Chase turns to the shaken young man.

“I won’t let you, Jack.” Chase stands up and signals Jack to do the same. But Jack struggles to sit up with his hands tied up. “You are wary of death; good, it will keep you aware and active. But don’t be scare, Jack, since you already cheat it death one. And, you’ll do it again if you must.” Jack uses his knees to push himself up. “I assure you.”


	7. Anger, Details, and Bargaining

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The focus shifts a little towards the monks. :>

jack has been dead for two days, and meditation wasn’t working.  
Omi tried to breathe deeply but his breath turned into a whimper which soon added up into an ugly sobbing noise.  
Nothing he did seem to slow down his tears. The others stopped crying last night and silently meditate since then.  
Omi couldn’t keep his eyes closed or his posture straight. His head gravitates downwards and he stares at his hands; jack’s blood was warm and redder than his hair.  
A bowl a food appears in front of him. Omi wonders how long has it been there.  
“Little partner?” Clay whispers.  
“We must not speak. Only grieve.” Omi shut any attend of a conversation. He took the food and eat the cold bean soup. He didn’t feel empty or full.  
Omi had never experienced loss before.  
Now.  
Now, jack has been dead for two days.  
Meditation wasn’t working.

Dojo enters the small room slowly. He stops in front of the monks and waits until Raimundo addresses him.  
“A Wu?” His voice is tired, but his posture is perfect. Discipline over the heart.  
“Yes.” Dojo talks softly as if he could shatter the young monks by mistake. “The Bùxìng de.” The Shen go Wu they lost. The showdown where jack die.  
It has only been two days.  
“The Bùxìng de is perhaps the most guarded Wu.”  
“I never heard of it.” Raimundo interrupts. He didn’t feel like going for the Wu, repeating the mission or being a leader when his team just wanted to mourn for a little longer. He felt a responsibility to stay and watch over his team.  
Omi stayed uncharacteristically quiet in his corner. The empty bowl of soup was gone. Everything leaves eventually. Omi thinks. Everyone will leave eventually. Fear creeps out of the young man and crawls deep from within Omi through his veins looking for an exit.  
“That’s because Bùxìng de is kept a secret from everyone until it manifest.” Master Fung says from the door frame.  
The monks bow and wait for him to continue.  
“Bùxìng de is too much of a temptation.” Master Fung explained and Omi looks at his dear teacher. “There are certain things we should never ask ourselves. Because is human to want what you shouldn’t.” Master Fung said and his students shook their heads on disagreement, but they stay quiet.  
Omi wasn’t hearing, he was lost and overwhelmed by the undeniable fact that everyone he knows will die. Sooner or later. jack die two days ago; how long did Master Fung have? How long his friends have? How much time Omi has before leaving forever?  
“The Bùxìng de has the ability to grant immortality and youth to the wearer.”  
Suddenly, Omi was listening.  
“We cannot allow this powerful Wu to fall in the hands of evil.” Dojo adds.  
“Whose?” Kimiko chews out. The hesitation in the room pushes her to explain. “Hannibal is already immortal, so is Chase, and Wuya is a ghost again -can you be an immortal ghost?” Anger fuels Kimiko. It moves her body, it boils her blood, and it lingers on her words. When her mother died, Kimiko was too young to understand sadness, acceptance, and hope. They were too heavy concepts for her young self. But anger; anger burns all sadness away. The trauma of death left her angry at everything until she burned through it.  
“Kimiko,” Raimundo calls her. An unspoken yet loud order to be quiet, to be respectful, and to obey. Raimundo was still a child when his aunt die from an illness; bronchitis crónica. He knew it was a complication, he remembers his mother screaming at the doctor ‘incompetent,’ but he already forgot so many details. The feeling of loneliness and the guilt that overtook him back then until he picked up his aunt’s old projects. Young Raimundo found peace in honoring death. He hoped it compensates for all the time they didn’t have.  
“The Wu is no longer hidden. It is only a matter of time before someone takes it. Raimundo, take a team of three.” Master Fung looks at Clay, who between all them, did not lose himself to grief.  
Clay nods, a single affirmation that he understood. He, the oldest is responsible for their team’s well being. A task too great for one person.  
Clay was born in a tractor, 200 feet from the hospital where his mother drove herself while in labor. She said ‘my boy is no picky. He is happy where he lands.’ A simple mentality that anchors Clay to who he is. A moral compass shaped in a Texas farm. Clay isn’t a stranger to death. He can’t remember when he understood that the animals he raised will be killed. He remembers when he understood that he might kill the animals he raised. Death was natural. Inevitable. Absolute. Equalitarian. Death is a tragedy that happens.  
Clay knew that losing someone wasn’t easy. Clay knew that no one gets used to death. And most importantly, Clay knew that the pain will pass.  
Eventually. It will pass.  
Clay nods and looks at Omi.  
Omi’s eyes are red and wide. He searches for a light at distant. The boy was paralyzed in place, still, trapped in the traumatic moment.  
Omi has never lost someone. 

Master Fung left. Incorrectly offering Omi space the youth didn’t want.

The night came slower than ever before.  
Three days.  
Omi remembers a conversation he had with Jack about ambition and the future. Jack said he would conquer the world. Omi didn’t want the world, but he did ask for fame and great power. Now, no one will get to know Jack.  
Omi wonders if he will also die young without accomplishing his goals. Or old watching young students surpass his skills.  
Jack wanted so much, he was so very ambitious. But ambition alone doesn’t make you evil, it doesn’t make you good either.  
Omi remembers too well Jack’s arguments.  
He hears light movements throughout the room. The other monks prepare to go to their mission. In silence, they dress, find their weapons and their way out. Omi follows after them.  
Dojo waits in the small plaza and he notes Omi.  
Raimundo stares at his youngest friend. Omi outgrew Raimundo two years ago, but he still looks like a child to Raimundo. Tonight, more than ever.  
“I want to go.” Omi states and the monks turn to each other.  
“Are you sure?” Clay walks closer to whisper.  
Omi simply nods and they make way for him.  
The flight is almost quiet.

The sound of Dojo cutting through the wind and Kimiko struggling to form a fire fall big enough to warm them and small enough to not burn Dojo’s back.  
The fire monk curses in her first tongue and tries for hours until she exhausted herself.  
It was too quiet and cold without Kimiko angrily summoning fire. 

Kimiko looks at Raimundo waiting for him to mock her, but he glares at the darkness surrounding them. She turns to look back at Omi who stares down to the ocean.  
Kimiko carefully turns until she is facing Omi. She waits until he notices her. Then, she puts her arms around him and brings him close to a tight loving hug. It was too much.  
Omi didn’t think. He hugs Kimiko back and let himself cry. He buries his face on her shoulder and feels her soft hair tickle his ear, he lets the pain he feels overtake him safely in her warm embrace. She whispers, is okay, it will be okay, and Omi hugs her tighter.  
Omi didn’t have experience with death. But, he knew too well people leaving you. Omi only experience had been devastating and definitive.  
The youngest monk held tighter than he has ever had. He images fictional memory of someone wrapping him in a blanket, quietly dropping him in the steps of the temple and leaving in the cold night forever when he is too small to follow them.  
It hurt too much.

They land at the shore of the island. The wind was chilly and the sky still dark as the first sun rays light one corner of the world. Kimiko slowly releases Omi and Raimundo calls them to assign each a territory to search.  
He opens a scroll with the picture of the rat. “Search your assigned area and capture the rat alive. If anyone runs into trouble, hide and call for help.” Raimundo carefully divided the island into three portions. He took the area last seen the rat, he sent Kimiko closer to the city and Clay towards the forest.  
He told Omi to stay in the shore and search around the ocean.  
The boy was too disrupted to understand he was being left out of the mission.  
“You can search with Dojo,” Raimundo adds.  
The sun slowly raises and Dojo mumbles something about magic. He told Omi to stay alert and stay near the shore.  
“I think there is someone here.”  
Omi nods and looks at the coastline. 

Waves raise and lower around the island. The ocean pulls the water in and then pushes out crashing into the shore. Omi closes his eyes and feels the ocean move under the surface. The currents and tides harmonious dance keeps the ocean alive. There is an old pure impossible to grasp magic resting deep underwater.  
And a speck of Heylin magic.  
The monk opens his eyes and stares at the open ocean.  
Omi runs hoping against all logic to find a miracle. He uses his name Wu to make a small ice patch and his control over water to propel him towards the Magic’s direction. A few miles into the ocean, Omi sees a surprisingly empty kelp forest.  
The waves around him were loud, the sky too bright and the sun heavy.  
Omi didn’t stop to think what was he doing until he jumps into the freezing water. The kelp forest enfolds him into deep cold darkness. Omi knew that whoever was hiding was not Jack. He manipulates the water currents and the algae open around him like a curtain revealing a tiny entrance to an underwater cave. The opening was so small it took more crawling than swimming to get in the cave. Omi was relief to find the medium size cave has good air circulation. He stops a little shock at his lack of planning and considers leaving to get the others. But then he hears a whimper.  
Omi runs in the dark chasing the echo of the cries. It didn’t sound human, but it might just be.  
“Hello?!” Omi screams. “Are you hurt? Do you need help?” He tries to see but his eyes can’t quite adjust. He turns and turns and can’t pinpoint the cries. “Are you-” Omi can’t see where he came from and suddenly he is thinking of an ongoing conversation he had with Jack a long time ago. What do you do when you know you are walking into a trap? “Is this a trap?” Omi answered you turn around, and felt very clever.  
A bright purple light illuminates a corner of the cave.  
“No. You weren’t supposed to find this place.”  
“Wuya.” Omi sees the ghost floating over a terrified-looking rat. He wonders if she will now hunt the island. He wonders if she can see Jack. He wonders if she still chooses to stay between the living after losing the last person who truly cared for her.  
“Omi.” Wuya could see the raw pain in Omi. A young man reduced to a scared child.  
A light silent felt between them. A mutual understanding of regret and grief.  
Wuya allowed the monk to stare in silence. Maybe she was too sentimental, and offer the child something few preys get; an opportunity to get away. Wuya didn’t mean to set a trap. She was truly hiding in the small cave, but it would be against her nature to not use the meek for her benefit. The witch carefully approaches Omi and stares into his clear brown eyes. The boy felt the supernatural cold and blindly light that the ghost emits. Then she moved to a different corner, under her the only entrance and exit to the small cave.  
The message was clear. Leave.  
Leave now.  
Omi remembers a specific conversation he had with Jack about ambition. The genius had at the time a black eye, Omi had given it to him and it made the small monk uncomfortable, even more so than drinking tea from a western tea set -it looked so very delicate. The porcelain was pretty and white but so painstaking fragile, it reminded him of Jack.  
*“Are you really good?”*  
“Was Jack evil?” Omi suddenly asks.  
He had so many conversations with the villain.  
First out of duty of course. Omi hoped beyond reason that he could convince Jack to become good. Jack laugh every time, and every time Omi returned home with nothing to show his friends; *why do you continue to go?*  
Omi had given up on helping Jack. He explained the day he thought to be his last social visit to the Spicer mansion that he didn’t think Jack was evil, but Jack didn’t want to be good either. 

“He wasn’t evil. Was he?” Omi thought that only Wuya could answer. 

*Whatever.* Jack dramatically said. But Omi could see how much pain it caused him to lose Omi’s visits; Jack was truly lonely and Omi knew this. But Omi couldn’t spend any more time or energy in trying to change Jack. *But before you go tell me; why do you want me to be good? What does it prove to you?*  
Omi couldn’t answer. So, he chose to come back and continued their conversation. He visited Jack for tea, snack and conversations he couldn’t have with anyone else. They were friends.

“‘Was?’” Wuya weights the world in her tongue. “Oh, you don’t know. Do you?”  
Omi stares at the ghost in confusion.

Alike when Jack asked him a rather odd question. Omi should have just gone home but he turned and asked. *What do you mean? I want you to be good because I can see goodness in your heart."*  
*“You don’t have to answer if you are gonna lie.”* Jack rolled his eyes back them, and Omi sat down to talk. 

Wuya appears face to face with the boy, her touch was like icy air and she slides next to Omi’s hear and whispers just loud enough for him to hear her.  
“He lied to you.”  
The cold air hurts. Omi steps back and falls in an attempt to get away.  
He looks up to see the witch in her human form. She removes her mask and dares Omi to question her.  
“What do you mean?”  
The witch looks exhausted, her dark skin was pasty, her green eyes empty, and her usually mocking smile gone.  
“Is okay. He lied to me too.” From the moment on, every word, every gesture, every pause was a calculated decision. “Jack is alive.”  
The immediate feeling of relief was quickly clouded by confusion. But Wuya clarifies every doubt or question.  
“He faked his death.”  
It sounded impossible, but after years of knowing Jack, Omi learned that he was frighteningly smart. He could figure out how to.

“Why? Chase Young asked him so.” Wuya filled in the silence.  
Omi knew that Jack loves Chase Young before he understood what it meant. His confusion and sadness twisted into frustration and hurt. 

Wuya sees Omi struggled with the taunting news. She looks at the child and finds his deepest fears and most delicate sentimental wounds -those which never heal.

“Jack isn’t coming for you, Omi. You are just, well, not that important.”  
Omi didn’t understand why that hurt more than anything else. He couldn’t feel the cold ocean pressure above him, he felt overwhelmed by the wish that his friend was dead instead of gone. Because Omi didn’t have experience with the loss of a loved one, but he knew about abandonment. Left without an explanation, a goodbye or a choice. Abandoned at night without a second thought.

Wuya softly reaches for the boy and speaks warmly. “Is okay, it’ll be okay. I know you were no one’s first choice.” Omi rejects those words but Wuya insists. “Jack didn’t even tell you, he doesn’t care about you.” Wuya appears on the other side of Omi and sinks her cold fingers in his shoulder. He flinched to her words unaware of her touch. “Not even the monks that raised you thought you were that impressive.” Omi tried to step away from Wuya but he was frozen in place listening to her every word. “After all, they gave a title that you work for all your life to a newcomer.”  
Wuya picks all of Omi’s doubts and exposes them to the surface. “Think about it, you studied and trained and lived all your life at the temple but you are still only the second best. The second best fighter, the second fastest runner, but you sure tried the hardest.” Wuya chuckles and extinguishes the light around them. Omi tries to defend himself or his friends, but there is a part of him that believes everything Wuya says.  
“They didn’t even choose you to become a monk, you were just there,” Wuya confirmed Omi’s deepest fear. “You think they knew?” Omi stares at the darkness in front of him. He wondered that many times. If the person that took him to the temple when he was a baby knew that he was only second best. They knew, so they left him to become someone else’s problem.  
A question that he only let his most ambiguous friend know. Jack Spicer tried to comfort him, but it didn’t matter anymore. Jack left him too.  
In the darkness, Omi cries and the echoes fill the empty space in the cave.  
“Is okay Omi,” Wuya whispers and lets the smallest hit of light slip from her form. “They never understood. No one does.” She tells him. “You have something that few people do, something they couldn’t see.” Wuya, let’s Omi cry until he can listen again. “But I can see it.” The boy faithfully waits. “You have ambition Omi. Ambition to go further than most don’t dare to even dream. Your ambition that belongs in great legends to be retold centuries from now. Omi, you have to be a hero in the story.”  
Hidden under the cold seawater, everything made sense.  
The sound of the rat’s cries almost forgotten in the darkness. 

Outside the cave, the other three monks started to worry.  
“Has it been too long?” Raimundo asked and Kimiko answered with a worried look. It was hard to tell, this was not their usual circumstance.  
“Give him time.” Clay sits down. “Maybe he found something.” He adds. They all searched their areas and meet at the smallest and sharpest peak of the mountain. No one found the rat and the sun was setting.  
Dojo curls into a small ball as guilt slowly eats him up.  
“I left for just a moment and-”  
“You were not supposed to leave at all.” Kimiko hisses.  
“Is okay!” Raimundo steps between them. “Omi is a very capable warrior. Maybe he just left for, um, a walk or something.”  
“He might need some alone time to clear his head,” Clay adds and they wait in silence until the last rays of sunlight disappeared.

“Maybe we should-” Kimiko never finished her sentence as she was forcefully shoved into the bush. She didn’t complain and follow the direction her leader pushed her. Sure that she would receive an answer soon enough.  
“Fudging fucking fudge!” Raimundo curses under his breath and he pointed with his chin upon the sky. The other two monks followed the direction with their eyes to see Hannibal.  
“We need to find Omi now!” Kimiko whispers.  
“Clay, Kim go find Omi. I’ll distract the old bean.” Raimundo ordered but Kimiko shakes her head.  
“You go for Omi, you are the fastest and I’m the best fighter and I can take him!” Kimiko stated as confident as she can lie.  
There was not time to discuss it.  
“Be careful Kim,” Raimundo says almost softly. That moment lasted but a second.  
Clay threw himself off the mountain and his landing unlevel the island so strongly an earthquake ripped through the ground. Raimundo lets himself be carried by the wind.  
Kimiko breathed in taking in the changes in her environment; Clay used a lot of energy trying to give her an advance, and she can use every advantage she can get.  
Hannibal noticed the monks heading to the shore, he also knew Wuya was hiding somewhere near with his Wu. His rotten smile pulled on his flesh higher to the point you could almost see the black of his gums. 

Kimiko propelled herself up leaving a trail of fire behind her. Hannibal’s bird easily passed her but she never tried to outrun the bird; a cowardly hit from the back would have to do. She shoots without regard for the creature, and the fire burnt the feathers sending the bird spiraling downwards. Hannibal rushed to leave the animal and instead reached for a tree. But thanks to the earthquake all the trees near them have been dug up from the dirt. The tree Roy had tried to reach couldn’t sustain his weight and it came down.  
He had similar luck with every tree and Kimiko used that to her advantage, she never stops attacking. But every fireball was well calculated to create the highest damage possible. She was trying to closed Hannibal’s exits, soon she would regret it but now her only objective was to keep that monster away from her friends. She had to, she is the best fighter if she can’t stop him now, then her teammates won’t have an easy time.  
Hannibal had avoided all attacks and pins his vines at the side of the mountain. “Are you trying to pick a fight with me little girl?”  
A tentacle hurled a large rock on her direction and she flies upwards only to find a second boulder, this one right over her. She had to quickly heat up the rock until it dissolves like lava around her, but she was still knocked down the floor.  
“They really should have sent someone else. You can’t defeat me.” Hannibal laughed like it had been fun. Kimiko breathed in and out, her anger fuels the fire burning around them. Her friends were still on the shore, she could feel them; something wasn’t right.  
“What is so important about this Wu anyways?” Kimiko darts her eyes around trying to find her enemy. “Where are you?” She screams. “Hiding? Are you scare?”  
She knew she can’t win.  
Hannibal shoots one of his roots around her, a clear popping sound on her shoulder, he credited her for not screaming.  
“You wouldn’t understand even if I explain it to you.” Then he felt the heat of her skin.  
The inside of his appendage boiled under her touch, he pulled back but Kimiko hold him still. She pushed the tentacle down on the ground against the lava she had just made and covered it. New attacks came in the form of multiple size roots, but that was fine. Every little fire around them grew and turned into a tornado of fire. Kimiko attacks Hannibal from every possible angle forcing him to go the only direction left; down. The dirt around him swallow him whole, his screams pierced the dying night.  
Kimiko jumped back and saw the hot molten lava over what she guessed was Hannibal, she didn’t stay to verified. She attends to run and join the others.  
The bean is not defeated only hurt, she, on the other hand, is done. She can’t fight again, her breath is hot and dried and her every muscle begged her to stop moving. The arm is dislocated and possibly broken.  
Kimiko runs for her life and she can still sense her friends. It made no sense. She stayed to fight so they could find Omi and escape. But if they stay, then they would have come to help her. 

Once she reached the beach she was too dizzy to stand. 

Raimundo and Clay rushed to her but did not touch her.  
“We-” Kimiko tried to tell them that they have to go, instead she was stopped by a bottle of water on her lips, she drank greedily.  
“Omi just left,” Raimundo said. Kimiko nodded unsure of what that meant. “He left us Kimi,” Raimundo explained and Kimiko stopped drinking.  
She wanted to ask what was happening but the sun was coming up and they needed to go.  
Omi would regret each his decisions that night.  
In two weeks Omi would succumb to temptation.


End file.
